Living Souls
by Kasamyra
Summary: "Don't you have some dead spirits to go commune with or something?" Lassiter asked sarcastically. "Oh, no, that's Shawn's forte. He deals with the dead, I only deal with living spirits," she smiled wryly. "The gift matches the personality you know. Shawn is exuberant enough to deal with the dead, I'm calm enough to deal with the living."
1. Chapter 1

Chapter One

Aislinn Kelley was not usually the type of person to sit in her car for hours, hesitating over something and arguing with herself, but this was a special occasion. The girl had parked her car about a block away from her destination, over two hours ago, but she had only brought herself to pull the keys out of the ignition. She was too nervous to get out of the car. Every instinct had warned her not to do this, her mother's voice in the back of her head repeated that exposing herself would lead to pain and probably death. But her mother was gone, leaving her alone in the world.

The back of her car held her clothes, an outdated laptop, a few mementos, and a small box of pictures. That was all Aislinn had to show for the last 32 years of life. She had never made friends before, or gone to college, or even had a job, her mother had kept her inside the house at all times, afraid that if Aislinn got close to someone, they would learn about her odd abilities and take her away. She had been allowed to go to a public high school, but only because her mother didn't have the time to home school her. And every morning, her mother would sit her down at the table before the bus came and tell her what horrible things would happen if she told anyone what she could do. So Aislinn had been that weird loner girl in school, with a few other loner people for company that she had considered friends, because they were the closest to friends she had there.

She might have been popular, if she were normal. In high school she was slim and fit from going to her mother's yoga classes with her so that the woman could 'keep an eye on her'. She had stopped growing after her freshman year, coming to 5'3", which was tall for her family. She had never met her father, he had died before she was born, but in the pictures she had of him he was no taller than her mother. She had inherited her parents bright red hair, and her father's green eyes, but she had avoided her mothers Irish temper, which she was thankful for. Overall, she considered herself to be pretty. Not beautiful, like some of the girls in her school were, but pretty enough that she could have joined their group had she talked to them. If she had been normal, and had decided not to join the cheerleading clique, she might have joined the music kids, which weren't as looked down upon as they were in the movies because some of the popular kids had joined choir and band for fun and made friends with the other choir and land kids, and Aislinn wasn't half bad at singing. She could stay on key all the way through the song at least. And if all that had failed, but she had still been a normal kid, she might have found her place with the English nerds. She had loved the subject in school and had taken all the non required English classes offered, surely, if she had tried, she could have fit in there.

But she wasn't normal, so she had ended up eating lunch at the nearly empty table in the back of the cafeteria, not talking to the few other people there.

Her hand rested on the door handle, which was the closest she had gotten to exiting the car since she had gotten into the city. Santa Barbara was bigger than her hometown in Wisconsin had been, but it wasn't too much different overall. There were a lot of the same fast-food places and chain stores, the same looking trees. It was more hilly, and the smell of the salt in the air from the ocean was sting enough that she could smell it some inside her car. She had always loved the ocean, but this was the first time she had ever seen it, which was maybe a little bit of the reason that she hadn't left the car yet. She had lived right next to Lake Michigan back home, and it looked a lot like the ocean, the waves and the beaches, though these beaches were nicer and the air didn't reek of dead fish, at least not from where Aislinn was sitting.

She pulled open her door, stepped out, shut the door, and locked it, all before she could argue herself into staying put. Standing on the side of the road would make her look stupid, so she got onto the sidewalk, walking slowly toward her destination, her feet dragging slowly, but her eyes darting around her at the people nearby. She usually wore thin skin colored gloves and long sleeved shirts, covering as much of her skin as possible, but she had left the gloves off today, so she could get an accurate feel of whether she should stay or not. It was disconcerting, knowing that at any second, her hand might brush against someone else's, or something that someone had touched, and that part of her brain that was not normal would supply her with images of things that weren't there, and the feelings that went along with them. She kept her hands clenched tightly in the pockets of her sweater, and by the time she had walked a block, she was sweating a little, both from nerves and from the heat of the day added to a sweater. Clothes were one of the hardest things for her to come by. They were necessary, and she was forced to touch them with her skin, which meant that the first few weeks of owning something were full of little flashed of how it was made, the people who had touched it's materials, the people who hung it in the store, the people who tried it on before she bought it. This was why she hung on to clothes for as long as possible. Once she had gotten past most of the memories that clung to the material, she could wear them freely. It was why her jeans were very faded and the bottom hems were ragged, and why her sweater had a stain on the bottom of it and a small tear in the elbow that had been clumsily repaired, and the pockets of it were torn on the sides. She could afford better, especially now that she had inherited all of her family's money. She had sold the house in Wisconsin that she had felt was a jail to her. Even if this didn't work out, she wouldn't go back there. She wasn't sure where she would go.

She realized she had been standing outside the door for a while, but she couldn't bring herself to open it quite yet, so she walked to the end of the boardwalk, looking out over the ocean, then back to the office, then she walked the length of the building once, twice, three times, and finally, she drew a breath and raised a hand to knock, her sweater sleeve pulled down over her hand so she wouldn't actually have to touch the door. Her effort was wasted when the door flew open before she could actually land a knock. She automatically took a step back, her hand back in her pockets, and looked up at the man standing in the doorway. He looked the same as he had in the papers, so she knew she was at the right place, as though the large letters spelling 'Psych' across the front window wasn't enough of a give away.

"Hello," the man said in an exuberant manner that had her smiling tentatively. "I sensed that you are in need of my services, please, come in," he stepped away and waved an arm to direct her into the building. She glanced back at her car once, she still had time to make an excuse, say she was lost, and leave. She took a deep breath, and then a step forward, walking past the man while giving him more distance than necessary. The office looked more like a male teenagers room, tv, gaming system, mini fridge, and she immediately relaxed a little. This was obviously not a place where they would try to ship her off to some government facility or a mental ward. At the worst, they would laugh her off or make her leave. She let out her breath.

"I'm Shawn Spencer, this is my partner Earnest Lambert Watkins," the man said, following her into the room after closing the front door.

"My name is Burton Guster," the other man said, throwing a glare at Shawn, then smiling in what he clearly thought was an attractive manner. "You can call me Gus," he continued, moving over to her and gesturing that she should sit not he couch. She shied away from the hand he reached out to guide her, and sat on the very edge of the couch, closest to the door, then charted her various escape routes as Shawn moved to sit in one of the arm chairs. The place probably had two doors, though she wasn't sure where the other one was, so she would have to take her chances with the front door, even though Shawn was between her and it. She turned to Shawn.

"I read about you in the paper," she said, her eyes still flitting around the room. "It said you are a psychic." Her voice had fallen almost to a whisper by the word psychic.

"That I am. The spirits guide me in all that I do," he said, over dramatically waving his arms about. She ignored that. She wasn't sure if he was telling the truth yet, he certainly seemed eccentric enough to communicate with the dead, the only other woman she had met who could talk to the spirits was also loud and outgoing. "What can we help you with? Cheating boyfriend? Missing person? Murder?" He drew the word out until it was funny rather than something horrible. She shook her head.

"I was… I'm…" It was so much harder to say than she had thought it would be. Years of her mother's warnings had made her barely able to think about it, let alone speak about it. She took in a breath. "I'm psychic too." Once the words were out, her heart began to pound against her chest, and her palms began to sweat. She wiped them on the inside of her sweater. "Not the same way you are, I don't talk to the dead, but I see things, about people, from the past, and I met this woman," the words were spilling out of her now, and she hoped they were making sense. "She could see a little of the future too, just concepts, but she said I should look for others like me and that I shouldn't be alone." She paused to take in a breath, and realized she had been looking in her lap as she spoke. She looked up in time to catch the briefest expression of doubt on Shawn's face before he hid it. She wasn't sure if it was doubt over the woman's prophecy or doubt over Aislinn herself. "It's just that most people who can… who are psychic, they keep to themselves and it's hard to find them, but you are in the paper and on the news sometimes, and all over the internet." She looked down again and was silent for a moment. "I can prove it." She looked up, this time sure the doubt on their face was for her.

"What's your name?" Shawn asked, glancing behind her at Gus, an eyebrow half raised. Aislinn shook her head.

"I'm not giving you my name until you believe me," she said. "I don't want to go to a mental asylum. I'm not crazy."

"We didn't say you were," Gus said, finally speaking up. He stood though, and shifted away from her, giving her the impression that his thoughts were different from his words.

"Look, I'll prove it," she said, pulling her hands from her pockets. She rested them on her legs as she leaned forward a little, looking at Shawn. If they were so hesitant to believe she was different from other people, he probably wasn't really psychic, but she had to be sure. She held her hands out, palms up in invitation to him, and he glanced again at Gus, then lifted his hands into hers. She could still see the office and the two men, but as soon as her skin made contact with his hands, another, slightly transparent image appeared. Somehow, and she was never quite sure how it worked, she was always completely aware of both places. Sometimes she could even push the images aside and almost ignore them, though they supplied her brain with information she would remember later anyway. Now she focused not he images in her mind. They flashed by at an alarming speed, but she was able to focus on each one and gather the information from it.

"As a child your father trained you to be a cop, he wanted you to follow after him in the line of duty, but after your parents got divorced you rebelled and left town. You travelled across the country, then when you got bored of that you travelled to other countries," her voice was soft but strong, it was the one she used when she spoke during visions, though she wasn't too sure why her voice became that one. The images flew in front of her eyes, different countries, colors, people, foods. "Your favorite place was Argentina. You liked their food the best, and their women. And their men," she added, getting another flash of image. She could hear the music and laughter and talking, she could almost feel the wet heat of the rain forests clinging to her skin, smell the damp earth and the smoke of campfires. The images were cut off as Shawn pulled his hands away quickly and stood.

"Their men, Shawn?" she head Gus ask in surprise. She frowned, she hadn't meant to cause drama between the two of them, and she hoped they wouldn't fight. Shawn just shrugged.

"I'm not picky," he said simply, then looked back at her.

"You aren't psychic," she said, frowning as her heart sank. She had put all her hope into this, and now she wasn't sure where to go. "You had to lie to stay out of jail, and now you enjoy it," she continues, recalling another flash of pictures and feelings.

"I really want to say you know all that from stalking me, but there's just no way…" Shawn said, trailing off. He looked at Gus. Then he looked back at her and shook his head. "There has to be some way you know that, who did you talk to?"

"No one," she said, getting to her feet. "I was born with this," she held her hands up in a half gesturing motion. "I don't know where it came from." He shook his head again, but sat back down, running a hand over his face as he thought.

"You were right bout everything though, even guessing you would have been off about something," he said, mostly to himself.

"Shawn," Gus said, breaking Shawn out of whatever thoughts he had been having. "This is impossible, you can't believe this."

"Let her touch your hands and see what she knows about you," Shawn retorted. Aislinn almost smiled. He believed her! Or at least, he was beginning to doubt himself. She turned to Gus, who frowned, then shook his head.

"No thanks," he said, but Shawn shook his head.

"Do it," he said, getting to his feet, a small frown on his face.

"Shawn, I don't want someone inside my head," he said, sitting down behind his desk and frowning.

"So you believe me then?" Aislinn asked, a half smile on her face.

"No," Gus said, shaking his head.

"If I'm lying I wouldn't be inside your head at all. And if you believe that I would be inside your head, then you believe I'm not lying," she reasoned, and he sighed.

"Fine, I believe you," he said, and Shawn paced the room.

"So you aren't going to have me locked up in a padded room somewhere?" She asked, her voice casual, but she stood, ready to bolt. Both men shook their heads and she let out a breath. She wasn't sure why she trusted them to be good to their word, but something inside her was telling her they weren't dangerous. She resumed her seat on the couch.

"My name is Aislinn Kelly, I grew up in Wisconsin," she said, finally introducing herself. Shawn sat back down in his chair and she could tell Gus was listening from his desk. "When I touch something I get, uh, visions I guess, of the memories attached to it. Images, sounds, feelings, smells. But it's only skin contact, I usually wear gloves. I've been able to do it since I was born, I learned how to talk and read faster than any other kids my age because I could see my mother's memories. My mother was convinced that if anyone knew I could do this that they would take me away from her, so I've never told anyone, but she died four months ago, and at the funeral there was this woman, she acted a lot like you actually," she said, gesturing to Shawn. "She was loud and eccentric, but she told me she knew what I could do and that I should look for others and that I should stay in Wisconsin alone. And I remembered reading about you int he paper, so I came here." They all sat in silence for a few minutes.

"Where are you staying while you are here?" Shawn finally asked, glancing at Gus. They seemed to be having a silent conversation of sorts.

"Nowhere. I just drove into town a few hours ago and I haven't decided if I'm staying," she said, looking between them. Shawn look back at her.

"Would you like to work on a case with us?" Shawn asked, grinning as Gus shook his head.

"A case?" She asked, tilting her head to the side a little.

"A police case. We got it this morning. I think, and my partner will eventually agree, that we could use someone like you to help us solve cases," Shawn said. "Also you know too many of our secrets so we want to keep you nearby."

"I won't tell anyone anything personal I learn, it feels like… cheating I guess. Like I can't help but to know things that people don't want to tell me, and it feels wrong to share those things with other people," Aislinn tried to explain.

"Even if they are criminals?" Shawn asked, raising an eye brow.

"But you aren't criminals," Aislinn said, confused.

"No, but if you work on our cases it would be really useful for you to be able to tell us who the bad guys are," Shawn said, smiling.

"Oh," Aislinn said, then thought about it for a moment. "Well, criminals deserve to go to jail, so if I can help with that I will," she said. Shawn nodded.

"So this case," he said, standing and walking over to his desk. "a bunch of really old books were stolen from this guys library. The their managed not to trip the security system on the house, or be caught on the cameras int he hallways. The library was on the third floor, but the only sign of forced entry was the window, and there is no way someone climbed down that way." Aislinn listened, not really knowing what she was supposed to do. "So, we have no idea who the their is or how he got into the room. Are you up for a ride?" It took her a second to realize he was asking her something.

"Um, sure, but I don't know what I'm supposed to do," she said, standing.

"Oh that's easy, just go touch things until you find the perp," he said, grinning as Gus stood as well. Aislinn frowned. It wasn't pleasant, getting memories off of things, especially if they led to a murder or something bad, but she figured a theft couldn't be too horrible.

"Okay," she said, nodding. Shawn grinned and the two of them led her out to the parking lot to a very odd looking blue car. She got into the back seat tentatively, making sure not to touch anything with her hands. She hesitated, then grabbed the seatbelt, ignoring the images that flashed through her mind of an older British man complaining, and of Gus being angry about having to sit in back, and of a cat curling up to sleep, and a few other people. Gus drove them to a house that was more a mansion than anything, and led them up to the foo and knocked. A butler opened the door and stood aside so they could enter.

"Mr. Spencer," the butler said, giving a little bow. "I'm afraid the Daniels have gone out for the afternoon," he said, but shut the door anyway.

"That's okay," Shawn said, grinning. "I was hoping to get another look at the room where the robbery occurred." His words sounded almost polite, but the tone he said them with made them sound mocking. She shook her head.

"Of course Detective," the man said, and Aislinn was confused for a moment, but didn't think about it too long as the man led them up the stairs to the third floor, then down the hall to a rather impressive personal library. She could see the spots not he shelves by the desk where books had obviously sat at one point, and she could see the cracked window fame behind the desk, rattling a little in the wind from outside. The butler bowed and left as Shawn and Gus walked around the room, looking at papers and things.

"Well, go ahead. Touch things," Shawn said, noticing that she had stayed by the door. She sighed then walked over to the window, resting a hand lightly against the wooden frame.

A small petite woman with dark blonde hair rolled into neat curls was outside the window, hanging down from a higher ledge, a thin rope tied around her waist. She kicked in the window, then swung inside. She wasn't young, but she wasn't old either, maybe in her forties. The woman crossed the room, Aislinn turning to follow her, her hand still resting on the window frame. The woman grabbed a few heavy volumes off the shelf where the missing books had been, and tucked them into a bag, then she carried them back to the window, her arms straining with the weight. She looked outside for a few moments, her eyes scanning the ground below until she finally saw something moving. Aislinn peered closer to see a man approaching the found below the window, walking carefully to stay on the rocks in the driveway. The woman dropped the bag of books out the window, watching just long enough to make sure he left, then she climbed out the window to the upper floor, leaving the window open. Aislinn blinked and pulled her hand away, frowning.

"It was a woman, maybe in her forties, short, dark blonde hair. She came in through the window from upstairs, and left the same way, but she dropped the books to a man who was waiting outside," Aislinn said, her voice conveying her confusion as to why anyone would do that. She hadn't gotten a reason, or feelings, with the images, which wasn't unusual for her, seeing as she had only touched something the person had brushed by, something without their essence on it. She ran her hand along the window to the lacy, and froze in surprise.

"Who do you think the blond woman is Shawn?" Gus was asking, but Aislinn didn't give him a chance to answer.

"She lives here, or is here often," she said, her mouth moving without he being conscious of letting it do so. "She's always alone when she comes here, she looks through the desk, she reads papers, and she always leaves the window open when she's here." The images faded away and she was left staring out into the yard and driveway.

"Wait, is this her?" Shawn asked, picking up a photo from the desk and turning it toward Aislinn. She looked, pulling ghee hand away from the window.

"Yeah, that's her, but that wasn't the guy she gave the books to. Can we go outside?" She asked, the question slipping through her lips. She hadn't meant to ask, but she felt like she should be out there.

"Sure, there's not much else in here," Shawn said, shrugging as he straightened the picture again. The butler was there with them as they walked back to the front doors and Aislinn stared at him as they walked. She waited until they were outside in the driveway underneath the window before she spoke.

"The man I saw, he looked a lot like the butler, but younger," she said, frowning. "It's possible I saw something that happened a long time ago… but the woman in the picture looked the same as the woman I saw…" She shook her head, confused.

"Maybe he has a son or a brother," Gus suggested.

"I'd guess brother, he wasn't wearing a ring and these upper class people want everyone associated with them to be respectable. They wouldn't hire someone with an illicit child, not if they knew about it," Shawn said. She wondered briefly how he knew that, but she had seen in his mind that he was very observant of the tiniest details. Or maybe he was basing that off of some tv show he had seen. Aislinn knelt in the driveway, running her hands over the gravel and larger stones, but she only got flashes of cars and valets.

"There's nothing here," she said, shaking her head as she stood. "What were those books that went missing?" She wasn't sure knowing would help her at all, but she was really curious about them.

"Something about the civil war," Shawn said, shrugging.

"They were handwritten accounts of the battle tactics used in the civil war, Shawn," Gus said, shaking his head. He turned to her to explain further. "They were written by the generals and colonels on the confederate side."

"So they were really valuable then?" She asked to clarify. Gus nodded.

"Mr. Daniels' grandfather was a general, he wrote some of those books. Mr. Daniels obsesses over them, he reads them all the time, and it's pretty much all he talked about last time we were here," Gus said. "He seemed really broken up about them."

"Well if they were valuable he had to have insurance on them, doesn't that make him a suspect?" She knew they were professionals and she probably didn't know what she was talking about, but she had to ask.

"Usually, yes it would, but the insurance policy on them hasn't been changed in years and he didn't update it to include the most recent book he added to that collection, which is also missing, so we don't think it's him," Shawn said, looking around him as they walked back to Gus's car. "Plus he wasn't in your vision was he?"

"I don't see everything," she said. "And the woman in there was wearing gloves and she didn't touch anything with her skin that time, so I can't tell what she was feeling when she was there. But…" she trailed off, just now recalling some of the other images she had gotten.

"But?" Shawn prompted.

"The other time's she was in that room she was upset, angry, jealous, and sad," she said, sure of herself.

"Hm," was all Shawn said as they drove back into town. They parked outside the police station, much to Aislinn's surprise, and Shawn and Gus both turned int heir seats to look at her. "As you know, I have an image to uphold here," Shawn began, and Gus roles his eyes. Aislinn could tell he was nervous, though she wasn't touching him at all. "If I'm putted as a fake now, not only will I go to jail, but Gus and my father will, and all the cases I've worked on could be brought back into question and the prisoners let go." Aislinn nodded in understanding.

"You can use whatever I tell you in your visions," she said, knowing that's what he was after. "I won't say anything about it, I promise." It felt a little childish, but she held out her pinky, a small smile on her face. Shawn raised a brow.

"You know the pinky promise is the most sacred of promises," he said seriously, though the corners of his mouth twitched up. Aislinn nodded solemnly, and ignored the small flood of images and feelings that flowed through her mind as Shawn completed the pinky promise, but she couldn't ignore the strongest of them.

"I know you are putting a lot of trust into someone you hardly know," she said, repeating back what he was thinking. "And there's not really anything I can say to make you not worry about that, but I can offer you something in return for your trust," she said, half unsure of what she was actually saying. He looked confused, not that she could blame him. "When I come into contact with the essence of someone, I learn their past, the pivotal points in their lives that made them into the person they are at that moment," she explained. "I don't see everything, just the important things, and there are a lot more of those in anyones life than they realize, and I've seen some of yours, that's how I know about you." She paused to make sure he was following. "I can return that favor if you let me, I can share some of my memories with you."

"I don't see how you telling me about yourself is supposed to make me trust you, I still hardly know you and I wouldn't know if you were lying," he said. She smiled.

"You could probably tell if I was, but that's not what I meant. I can show you my memories, the same way I saw yours," she said. It was something she had learned how to do as a baby, before she could talk, when she wanted something she could put the image of it into her mothers mind. Shawn glanced at Gus, who shrugged, then turned back in his seat.

"Okay sure, what do I need to do?" Shawn asked, facing her. She slid into the middle of the back seat.

"Just close your eyes and keep an open mind," she said, smiling. He hesitated, then closed his eyes. She brought her hands to the sides of his face, the tips of her fingers resting over his temples, and closed her eyes, then let her mind open. The images flashed in front of her eyes as a normal vision did, and she was sure he was seeing the same things, because he gasped and pulled away, breaking the connection only seconds after she had begun.

"What the hell?" He asked, rubbing his head.

"Oh, sorry, I should have warned you about the headache," she said. "I used to get them all the time when I was younger until I got used to the visions. I forgot," she frowned.

"All your visions are like that?" He asked, no longer rubbing his head.

"Yeah, but I've learned how to sort through it all so that I can remember it. Isn't that what you do with crime scenes?" She hadn't made the connection until just then that Shawn must have some sort of memory tricks he uses.

"I have an eidetic memory," Shawn said, nodding.

"Then you can recall all the things you just saw," she said, nodding. "I have the same thing, but it's only with things I see through my visions, not with things I actually see."

"That was the weirdest thing I've ever done," Shawn said, shaking his head.

"I wasn't done, I can show you more if you still don't trust me," she said.

"Nah, we're good," Shawn said, grinning. "So you've never had a job before? That's really weird."

"I've never needed one. And you can't talk, you've had more than fifty jobs," she said, but she was smiling.

"Shawn," Gus said, frowning. "You can't just trust her like that, she could be anyone."

"Could be, but she's not," Shawn said.

"I can show you too if you want," she said, looking towards him. She expected him to say no, but he glanced at Shawn, then at her, then back, finally nodding. He turned in his seat and closed his eyes.

"It'll give you a headache," she warned, and he nodded. "And if you don't have perfect memory recall you won't remember much of it," she said, her hands hovering over his temples until he shrugged. She closed her eyes, ignoring the flood of images she got from him, and focusing on her own memories. To his credit, Gus sat through almost the whole thing, it only took about twenty seconds. He shook his head, his eyes screwed shut as he rubbed his forehead.

"Good god woman, you must live on Excedrin," he said, and she smiled.

"I got used to it, I only get the headaches when I touch something with a lot of sentimental value to more than one person," she said.

"Okay, now that that's all settled, lets go bother Lassie," Shawn said, opening the car door. Aislinn and Gus followed him up the steps.

Aislinn only knew who 'Lassie' was through the memories she had gotten off the boys, but both of them seemed to see him as a friend, to an extent. They both would care if he was killed, for instance, but neither of them would ever say as much. And they seemed to like to push him to the breaking point. She wondered if he felt the same way about the two man children, but didn't want to see his memories to find out. Through Shawn and Gus's memories, she could tell that they had seen a lot of unsettling things, and she was sure that, as a cop, Lassiter had seen more.

As they walked up the steps to the station, she realized that she had tucked her gloves into her sweater pocket before she had gotten out of her car. She slipped them on, making sure the tops of the gloves were covered by her sweater sleeves. It was still much too hot to really be wearing a sweater, she was still sweating lightly from all the running around they had been doing that day. She wasn't sure she was allowed to follow the two into the deeper parts of the police station, but they didn't stop walking, so she followed, trying to look like she belonged there. They stopped at an empty desk, a few of the passing people nodding to Shawn as though they saw him there a lot, and stopped.

"Huh," Shawn said, looking around them. "I thought for sure they'd be here, I haven't heard anything on my police scanner all day." Gus wandered off towards a vending machine, shaking his head, and Shawn plopped down into the chair behind the desk. Aislinn stood in front of the desk, nervously playing with the ends of her hair. There were a lot of people here, she wasn't really used to being around a lot of people, and it made her nervous that someone was going to bump into her or something. She saw Gus sit down on a bench against the wall and was just considering going to join him when she felt more than heard two people walk up behind her.

"What the hell Spencer," the man said, and Aislinn turned around to face them, taking a step back as she did so. "Get out of my chair." She recognized the man as Detective Lassiter, and the woman as Juliet O'Hara, the woman that Shawn flirted with more than he flirted with everyone else. She was pretty, though she looked different through Shawn's eyes than she did to Aislinn now. Aislinn smiled at her, but lowered her eyes when she noticed Lassiter's glare, even though it wasn't directed at her.

"I'm here about the case we've been working on," Shawn said, hopping out of the chair and lifting his hand to his head. She almost laughed at how ridiculous he looked. "I'm sensing-"

"Did you bring a date to the police station?" Lassiter interrupted, making Shawn sigh with fake annoyance. Aislinn shook her head, a small smile on her face.

"Of course not," Shawn said, walking around the desk to drape an arm over Aislinn's shoulder and turn her to face them completely. "This is the lovely Aislinn Kelly, and I'm not her type. She's more into tall, dark, and handsome, salt and pepper hairs detectives with nice blue eyes." He winked at Lassiter and Aislinn shrugged his arm off of her then quickly hit him in the back of the head. He winced over dramatically. "Okay fine, she's more into beautiful blonde haired detectives with nice cheekbones and blue eyes?"

"Shawn." Her voice was impatient and she was considering smacking him again. She half lifted her hand but he flinched away.

"Okay fine, it's not like you've given me anything to work with here," he said, then turned back to the two. "Aislinn is the newest member of the Psych family. Now, back to my divining." He raised his had again, but was this time interrupted by Juliet.

"Psych family? You work for them?" She was speaking to Aislinn this time.

"No, this is a trial run," Aislinn said, shaking her head.

"Aislinn!" Shawn cried. "Don't be the cold fresh fry in the bottom of the bag! You have to work with us, we've already bought you a desk and everything!"

"I hope that wasn't with my credit card Shawn," Gus said walking up to the group.

"Of course not, it was with mine," Shawn said.

"You don't have a credit card Shawn," Gus scowled.

"Get to the point Shawn," Aislinn said with a sigh.

"I sense that the Daniels' butler has a younger brother, maybe an illegitimate son. Possibly a cousin. Maybe a nephew," Shawn said, his face scrunched up weirdly. Gus elbowed him. "If you fine him, you'll fine the books."

"We did check out the butler," Juliet said, going over to her dest to grab a file and flipping it open. She read for a moment, then tapped the page with her hand. "Says here he live with his wife and two children, and his younger brother, not too far from the Daniels' home. So you think he stole the books?"

"Yes," Shawn said, and this time Aislinn elbowed him. "No. I sense that he was an accomplice. The real their was the queen."

"The queen?" Gus asked. "Queen Elizabeth?"

"No, no, not the queen, the queen to be," Shawn said, and Aislinn was completely lost.

"The princess?" She asked, tilting her head.

"Yes, the princess," Shawn was practically flopping around now, grabbing things from Lassiter's desk.

"Yeah, that's great Spencer-" Lassiter began, but Shawn lunged forward and covered Lassiter's face. Aislinn did giggle now.

"Princess Beatrice?" Gus asked. Shawn dropped the act for a moment to give him a look of exasperation.

"Who the hell is that?"

"She's the crown princess of England, Shawn. Maybe if you bothered paying attention to anything besides food you would know that," Gus said.

"Princess Diana?" Aislinn added, smiling now.

"Yes, Diana!" Shawn said, falling back into the 'vision' by leaning against Lassiter's desk. "But she's no princess, she's a dirty dirty liar."

"Diana Daniels? The wife?" Lassiter asked incredulously.

"Yes, I'm sensing that she is the one who took the books. She entered the room through the window, using her bedroom right above it to stage the operation. She took the books and dropped them down to her willing servant, the butler's son, who took them and vanished into the night," Shawn said, collapsing into Gus who pushed him into Aislinn. Aislinn grabbed his elbow so he wouldn't fall. trying to hide her smile. Shawn was very good at acting like an idiot.

"Why would she do that?" Juliet asked, and all the little bits of information her visions had given her suddenly clicked into place.

"Because she was jealous," Aislinn said, her eyes blank as she remembered the visions. "Her husband spent more time reading those books then he spent with her. She was angry that he cared more about some dusty old books than about their marriage. She thought that getting rid of the books will mean that he will pay more attention to her, but she's wrong, because he's having an affair with…" she trailed off, waiting for just a second longer for the last piece of her vision to settle in. In the vision she had seen before, of the wife going through the desk drawers, she had seen a photo on the desk of the couple, and another girl, a tanned dark haired girl, all of them sitting around a table. The two women had been leaning in to each other, obviously talking, while the husband had been looking at them, but he wasn't looking at his wife with that adoring expression, he was looking at the other girl, around the same age as his wife. They had to have been friends. Not sisters, they didn't look enough alike for that. "her best friend," Aislinn finished, connecting all the information in barely a half a second. She glanced up at Shawn who's mouth had fallen open. "Oh, sorry Shawn," she said, frowning. "I just figured that out now."

"What is this?" Lassiter finally said, looking between Aislinn and Shawn as though they were playing some kind of joke on him.

"Oh, didn't I mention that Aislinn is a psychic too?" Shawn said, grinning. Aislinn tensed, still not liking that people knew that about her.

"Oh is she now?" Lassiter asked, his lips turning up into a sarcastic smirk. "Well why don't you and your new psychic friend leave the station and never come back. Sound good?" He asked, putting a hand on Shawn's shoulder and beginning to lead him away towards the door. Gus followed casually.

"So you're a psychic too?" Juliet asked as Aislinn was about to follow. She shrugged.

"Not like Shawn is," she said, which was true. She was still a little proud of herself for making the connection of the husband and the friend. It was exciting, figuring out a puzzle. As long as it turned out to be true anyway, which she was only about %85 sure about.

"Thank god for that," Lassiter said, returning to his desk in time to catch their conversation. "There is only so much of that insanity I can handle."

"He's really not a bad person," Aislinn tried, but Lassiter just raised an eyebrow.

"Don't you have some dead spirits to go commune with or something?" Lassiter asked sarcastically. She smiled and decided that if she was going to be hanging out with Shawn and Gus that she may as well learn to rile him up since it seemed to be one of their favorite things to do.

"Oh, no, that's Shawn's forte. He deals with the dead, I only deal with living spirits," she smiled wryly. "The gift matches the personality you know. Shawn is exuberant enough to deal with the dead, I'm calm enough to deal with the living." She did her best to make her voice sound all knowing, and she was pleased to see that O'Hara edged away from her a little. She gave them one last smile and turned to find Shawn and Gus.

"O'Hara, look up that girl, I want to make sure she didn't just escape from an insane asylum," Lassiter said, not quite waiting until Aislinn was out of ear shot. She frowned and considered going back and trying to make them think she was normal again, but as she rounded the corner Shawn and Gus were there, both with their hand's help up for high fives.

"That was great, he was so spooked," Shawn said, grinning. She gave them both high fives.

"Are you wearing gloves?" Gus asked, frowning at her.

"Yes, I said I wear them most of the time. I don't like getting flashes of memory form everything I touch you know," she said as they left the station and went back to the car.

"So, are you staying in Santa Barbara?" Shawn asked as Gus started the engine.

"Well, I don't have anywhere else to go," she said. "And if we actually solved that case, that would be really cool."

"Oh we solved it," Shawn said, smirking. "How'd you know about the affair? I totally didn't get that."

"That's because you aren't psychic Shawn," Gus said.

"In one of the visions of her going through the desk, there was a framed picture of the three of them on the desk," she said. "It was obvious in the picture that they were friends and that the husband was staring at the friend."

"Well nice work," Shawn said, grinning.

"I didn't mean to take away your big reveal," she said, frowning.

"Nah it's fine. They have to learn that theres more than one psychic in town now," Shawn said. "Oh Gus, lets stop for smoothies."

"Technically, theres still only one psychic, since you were never one to begin with," Gus pointed out, driving past the smoothie place Shawn had pointed out.

"I need to find a place to live," Aislinn said, sighing. "Do you know anywhere that's renting?"

"Oh, I know this little old woman who owns an old restaurant thats closed down, you could move in there," Shawn said. "She would probably give you a good deal on the rent."

"I don't need a good deal on the rent," she said, rolling her eyes. "And I'd rather live in a real apartment."

"One of my work friends has a sister that owns a bunch of apartment buildings around town, I gan call her up and see if she has anything open," Gus said, watching the roads.

"That would be great. I've never been apartment shopping before, so I don't really know anything about them," Aislinn said, looking out the window.

"Well we'll help you out," Gus said, smiling now. He wasn't nearly as standoffish of her as he had been before she had shared some of her memories with him. "That's what friends are for right?"

She smiled at that, realizing that it was true, they could be considered her friends, the first real ones she'd ever had.

"Thanks."


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter Two

By late-afternoon, Gus had called his friend about an apartment and set up a viewing for the next morning.

"You can sleep here for the night if you want," he said, gesturing to the couch in the Psych office. "Or maybe you can stay with Shawn's dad?" He said this while looking at Shawn. Shawn was busy bouncing a tennis ball off the wall and catching it and he didn't seem to be paying attention.

"It's fine, I'll stay here tonight," she said, smiling.

"Great," Gus said, glaring at Shawn. "It's actually pretty well set up to live in. There's a shower in the bathroom, back there," he pointed. "There are blankets and pillows in the closet, and if you like coffee, there's a coffee maker. You can eat whatever you find in the fridge that is marked 'Shawn' and before I forget, let me put our numbers in your phone," he said. She handed it over and watched him type for a moment.

"Thanks," she said when he handed it back.

"I put Henry's number in there too, for emergency. That's Shawn's dad," he said. She nodded, having already known that. "Now, I need to go home and start working on my real job." He said this with an air of importance, and Shawn snorted.

"That job is so boring," he said, shaking his head as he turned away from the wall, letting the tennis ball he had just thrown bounce toward them. Aislinn caught it before it could knock anything off of Gus's desk and tossed it back at him. Sadly, he caught it before it could hit his head.

"So I was thinking," Shawn began once Gus had left.

"That's dangerous," Aislinn replied automatically. It was something her mother always used to say to tease her. Shawn gave her a look but didn't comment.

"Earlier, when you were showing me your memories, you left out all the boring parts, like the things that don't matter, and I'm assuming you left out embarrassing things too since i didn't get any of those," Shawn said, his face thoughtful.

"Yeah, well, the boring things don't matter," she said, shrugging.

"So you can control what thoughts you are sharing?" He asked, leaning forward on his desk.

"I guess so. I didn't do it on purpose," she said, settling in to the couch.

"But you could," he said, trilling off.

"Maybe. I've never tried it before," she said, thinking back to the few times she had shared her memories with her mother. "I shared my thoughts with my mother sometimes, but not since I was really young, and back then I didn't know it wasn't a normal thing to do, and once I knew it was weird, I never tried it, until today."

"Well maybe if you can control what memories go out, you can control what memories come it when you touch things," he said.

"I don't see how that would be useful. What if something I block out is the important piece to figuring something else out?" She asked, frowning.

"I meant more along the lines of talking," he said, finally getting to the point. "Like mind to mind communication."

"I can't read minds Shawn," she said, but she was frowning.

"Have you ever tried? It seems to me that as soon as you touch someone you get their memories and stuff, but you pull away before you can figure out how to control them," he said.

"You mean like mind control? I'm not doing that Shawn," she said, shaking her head.

"No, not controlling their minds, just controlling what you get from them. You said you get the feelings and reasons behind what people are doing in your visions right?" He asked, standing to pace now.

"Yeah," she said slowly.

"Well maybe if you learned how to focus what you can do to only see what you want to see, you could read peoples minds," he said, coming to a stop in front of the couch.

"I'd have to be touching them Shawn," she said, shaking her head. "I still don't see how that would be useful."

"Think of it like working out. In order to lift more weight you have to work out your arms, but you also have to work out your abs and legs or something like that," he said, plopping down in an armchair.

"You got that from a book," she said, half recognizing the line though she couldn't place it.

"Well it makes sense," he said. "In order to control your gift you have to learn everything it can do."

""Yeah, that's why I was trying to find other people like me, so I can learn from them," she said, nodding.

"Well you can learn from me," he said, grinning.

"I don't think that counts Shawn," she said, almost laughing.

"Just try it," he said, holding his hands out in front of him.

"I don't even know how to start trying to learn that," she said, shaking her head.

"But don't you think it would be useful to talk without talking? If we are on a stakeout of something?" He said, still holding his hands out in front of him.

"I guess," she said, looking at his hands. "But it might take a while to get right. My mom used to think that meditation would help me control the visions but it was really boring and I couldn't concentrate."

"So she took you to Yoga classes," he continued. "Yeah I got that all up here," he said, tapping his head. She smiled.

"Okay, I'll try," she said, pulling her gloves off of her hands. He grinned and held his hands out to her again but she shook her head. "Let's sit on the floor in front of the coffee table. It might take a while and my arms will get sore if you aren't resting your hands on something." They both shifted, Aislinn sliding down to sit between the couch and the coffee table, and Shawn moving to sit across from her. He rested his hands on the table and Aislinn took a deep breath in to try to clear her mind, then she took his hands into hers and closed her eyes. There was the initial flash of memories, things she stored away for later, and an undertone of feelings and smells and color. She took another deep breath in, slowly, and pushed the images aside, to the back of her brain. She could still feel them, and she still watched them with a corner of her mind, but now she was focused more on reality no, she was aware of Shawn's hands in hers, and she could hear both of their breathing. She frowned. Maybe that wasn't the right way to go about it. Her connection to Shawn was in the images, and pushing them away didn't seem to make any other connection come forward. She pulled the stream of images back to the front of her mind and focused on them again. There was nothing new there, she had seen all of these memories already. She tried to slow them down, tried to focus more on each individual memory, feeling the thoughts and emotions behind each one until they were playing in front of her at a normal speed. She took another breath in and tried pausing them all together. The image froze in her mind, of a house, his dad's house, and a beach and him and Gus as children playing in the front yard. She tried pulling the memory into her, thinking that maybe she could find where that was coming from and follow the connection into his head to see what he was thinking, but suddenly the image was gone, and so were Shawn's hands. She opened her eyes, frowning in confusion.

"Whatever you just did really hurt," he said, rubbing his forehead.

"Sorry," she said. "I didn't realize it would affect you." She frowned again. "What exactly happened?"

"I dunno," he said, shrugging. "It felt like you were sifting around in my brain and pulling things out."

"Oh," she said. "I won't try that again. But I think I sort of am getting the hang of it."

"Okay," he said, setting his hands back on the table, palm up. She rested her hands on his and closed her eyes, this time immediately able to pause the memories when they came in. She had never actually tried not to receive memories from things before, and now that she was able to stop them, at least sort of stop them, it seemed like the obvious thing that she should have done years ago. She looked at the memory now, trying to see it from the outside, like a movie screen, rather than being in the movie, and she managed to pull herself away from it. It took her a few moments to completely be able to pull her mind away from it. This seemed to work better. She wasn't shoving the connection away, just pulling herself back to look at it better. And now that she wasn't focused on the memory itself, she could see a thin line of changing color and light stretching from the memory towards Shawn, though she couldn't see him. In the place where she knew he was sitting she could see a faint, reddish orange glow in the general shape of a person. She followed the faint line connecting them toward the light, curious as to what it was. The closer she got, the harder it was to follow the line, until finally it was just gone. She opened her eyes, frowning, but her hands were still on Shawn's. His eyes were closed, and she was briefly surprised that he could sit still that long, but then she realized she didn't even know how long that had taken. It had felt like hours, but the sun was still up, so it couldn't have been that long.

"Shawn?" She asked, frowning. Had he fallen asleep? Why weren't the memories there anymore. He opened his eyes, tilting his head to one side.

"What?" He asked, wondering why she had stopped.

"That's weird," she said, drawing her hands away, then putting them back. She shook her head. "I don't see the memories anymore. I'm not sure what happened."

"You don't see anything?" He asked. "Maybe I ran out of memories."

"No, they should still be there," she said, though now she wasn't sure. She had seen repeats of memories earlier, so she just assumed they would keep replaying. She closed her eyes and focused back in the part of her mind where the memories always played, though she wasn't sure how she knew that. It was blank, but the line was still there, light and changing, almost shifting. She slated the memories again, just how she had stopped them, and then there they were, new ones too, of the conversation they had just had. She frowned, frustrated that she didn't seem to be able to do anything besides stop and start the memories. She sighed. Well, at least that was something. There was a little tickling in the back of her mind as she made to give up, and she frowned. It felt different from the way the memories felt. She poked at it with her mind for a moment, and suddenly there was a burst of noise, too jumbles to make out, and very loud. She automatically covered her days with her hands, and the voiced were gone.

"What happened?" Shawn asked, his face concerned. She shook her head.

"I think I just figured something out," she said, grinning and reaching for his hands again. As she had pulled her hands away and there was silence again, she had a second to catch the end of the noise, and it had definitely sounded like Shawn's voice. He gave her his hands again, and she closed her eyes, ignoring the restart of the memory slideshow and focusing on the little part in the back of her mind that tickled slightly. She didn't jerk her hands away when the loud noise overwhelmed her this time, instead she pushed it away a little, only letting parts of it come through at a time.

'She looks a little pale, maybe this is a bad idea,' she heard in his voice, though she was sure it wasn't something he said aloud.

"I'm fine," she replied aloud, and grinned, opening her eyes. "And I think it was a good idea."

'That is really disconcerting, kinda creepy,' he thought, then opened his eyes and raised an eyebrow in question.

"It's not that creepy, you're the one who thought it would be a good idea," she replied, rolling her eyes. He pulled his hands away and the voice was gone.

"Do you think you can do that all the time now or will you have to sit and sift through their minds first?" He asked, returning the grin.

"I think I can do it all the time, now that I know how to. And I think I know how to stop most of the visions now," she said, though she didn't try explaining it all to him, knowing he wouldn't really understand it. "You're brain is really loud but he way. Though maybe that's normal."

"Nah, I have a super brain," he said, getting to his feet and stretching. "So can you give me thoughts back just like the memories?"

"I don't know," she said standing. "Come here, let me try." He stepped closer and she set her fingers against the sides of his head and closed her eyes. She could still hear his thoughts in the back of her mind, thinking about how cool it would be to be able to talk to each other without talking. She smiled a little, amused.

'Shawn?' She thought, and she could tell it had worked because his thoughts went from wondering, to surprise, and then to excitement.

'This is literally the coolest thing I've ever done,' he thought and she laughed, but it was in her mind, not out loud.

'I'm going to have to agree with you,' she thought back.

'Do you have to be touching my head and have your eyes closed?' He asked, and she opened her eyes to see he was already looking at her. She drew her hands away, breaking the connection, then touched the hand he lifted.

'Can you hear me now?' She thought, trying to mimic the annoying cell phone commercial. His face broke out into a grin.

'Awesome,' he though, and she dropped her hand, feeling a headache building.

"I think that's enough of that for the day," she said, rubbing her temples. She glanced at the clock and frowned. "How did that take less than half an hour? It felt like a lot longer than that," she said.

"It did," he agreed, then shrugged. "I hate to ditch out on you," he began and she grinned.

"But there's a hot bartender at the bar you go to that get's off her shift in an hour and you want to go flirt," she said. He grinned and shook his head.

"It's a little weird that you know so much about me but we just met this morning," he said, looking around for his motorcycle helmet.

"But you know about me too," she pointed out.

"Not really. Just unimportant things like what school you went to," he said, finding the helmet.

"What's my favorite color?" She asked, her hands on her hips.

"Purple," he said automatically. "Hm," he said frowning. "I didn't know I knew that. And your favorite food is bread. That's weird."

"Not really. I shared memories with you, and just because you didn't notice things doesn't mean your brain didn't pick up on them," she said, sitting back down on the couch.

"No, I meant it's weird that your favorite food is bread when there are so many better things out there," he said, grinning.

"Like pineapple?" She asked, returning the grin.

"I was actually assuming you had excluded pineapple, because there is nothing better than that," he said.

"It is delicious," she said, nodding. "Now go away and flirt with your lady friend."

"Lady friend?" he snorted. "What century is this again?" She tossed a pillow at him and he dodged it, then left, making sure the door was locked behind him. She sighed and looked around the rapidly darkening office. It wasn't too late, only a little after seven, but she was exhausted after the day of driving, running around, and overall stress of the morning, added to the stress of trying to control her gift. She lowered the blinds, then frowned. She hadn't brought any of her clothes inside, so she didn't have anything else to sleep in. She shrugged out of her sweater, then pulled the t-shirt over her head too, settling for the camisole she was wearing underneath that. She wondered briefly if she could get away with sleeping in her underwear, but decided to leave her jeans on, just in case one of the boys came in before she woke up. She settled into the couch, turning so her face was buried between the back of the couch and the pillow. The couch was really more of a love seat, and it was too short for her to stretch all the way out on, but she usually slept curled up anyway, so it wasn't too uncomfortable. She was asleep before the sun had fully set.

The next morning she was awoken to loud knocking, and she jumped up in surprise, almost tripping over the coffee table. She opened the front door as she would have done back home, not thinking about who would be on the other side, and only belatedly remembered that she was in a strange city and probably should be more careful about opening the door to people. Shawn was the one pounding on the door.

"I forgot my key," he explained, rushing in past her. "Our simple stolen book case just turned into a murder. Let's go," he said, grabbing a paper from the file on his desk. She sighed.

"I don't want to see any dead bodies," she said, pulling her t-shirt from yesterday back on. It didn't look too ruffled, and she didn't want to waste time hunting through her car for clothes. She ran a hand over her hair, wicking she had a hairbrush too, then twisted it back into a bun so it wouldn't get too tangled. She decided to leave the sweater, fairly confident that she would be able to stop the onslaught of visions now that she knew it was possible to do.

"They already took the body, but I want to solve it before Lassie does," Shawn said, grinning. "You drive."

"There's not a lot of room in my car," she warned, following him up the street. She directed him to the right car when he hesitated. The front seat was mostly clear anyway, and she unlocked the doors to let him in.

"When you get your apartment we will have to go furniture shopping," he said, seeming excited at the idea. She shook her head.

"I'm not buying anything you suggest," she said, and he huffed. "Where to? And where's Gus today?"

"At his boring job. Go up this street, turn right at the light," he said. He was practically bouncing in his seat the entire way.

"So who got killed?" She asked as he directed her out of the crowded part of the city.

"I don't know yet, I just heard it on the scanner this morning," he said.

"Why were you up so early?" She asked.

"I'm always up early. I don't sleep that much, maybe four hours a night," he said distractedly as they pulled up the driveway of the mansion house and stopped next to a squad car. "They found the books in the butlers brother's bedroom but he was gone, and they came up to arrest the wife this morning after finding a note she wrote to the brother about the books," Shawn said. "Jules texted me that this morning." His phone rang as they were getting out of the car. "Speak of the devil," he grinned. "Hey Jules," he said into the phone. Aislinn couldn't hear her half of the conversation, but got the gist of it from Shawn. "We'll be right there."

"Did they just call you to come here?" She asked, grinning.

"Yep," he said. "I love it when the have to ask for my help." She shook her head and followed him in through the already open doors, only to come to a stop at the sight of the dead husband.

"Shawn," Aislinn hissed, staring at the body. "You said the body was gone already."

"My bad," he said, shrugging. "I must have been getting a vision from the not so distant future." She hit his arm.

"Shawn," Juliet said, frowning as she walked over. "I just called you like two minutes ago."

"We were in the neighborhood," he said, his eyes flicking around the room.

"Hello," Juliet said politely to Aislinn.

"Hi," she said, smiling. She was glad the other woman wasn't scared of her, even though she had stepped away from her yesterday.

"I don't think we were really properly introduced yesterday," Juliet said, holding her hand out. Aislinn frowned for a second, half wishing she had worn her sweater and gloves, but kind of glad she hadn't. If she was going to be seeing these people a lot, maybe she should take the opportunity to learn about them. But it didn't seem fair to do that using her gift. It felt like cheating. She held her hand out for Juliet to shake. "I'm Juliet O'Hara." Aislinn felt the flash of memories begin, but she cut it off immediately.

"Aislinn Kelly," she replied, ignoring the slight pounding in the back of her head.

'I love her hair. I wish I could pull off red hair,' the thought in Juliet's voice slipped through even though Aislinn wasn't looking for it.

"I think blonde hair suits you," Aislinn said without thinking. Juliet frowned and took a step back.

"What?" She asked, her voice surprised.

"Blonde hair," Aislinn said, trying to play it off as something she had meant to say. "It suits you." Juliet's eyes widened a little, but she shook her head and turned to Shawn who hadn't been paying attention to them. Aislinn didn't follow them as they approached the dead body, and she tried her best not to look at it. She stood near the front doors, ignoring the crying wife and the forensics people who came and went.

"Any ideas?" She asked Shawn as he came over to stand by her.

"They think it was either the wife or the mistress. Though apparently she didn't know about the affair until… recently," he said.

"In other words you told her and she was really surprised," she guessed. He shrugged but didn't say anything more as some other officers came near them. Aislinn watched the crying woman for a moment, the frowned and reached over to touch Shawn's arm.

'I don't think it's the wife, she looks devastated, and what reason would the mistress have to kill him?' She thought, and Shawn jumped, nearly pulling his arm away before he realized what she was doing.

'I don't think it's the wife either,' he thought. 'The butler found him this morning and the wife was actually at the mistresses house until an hour ago.'

'So what now?' she asked, stepping back as Shawn did to let an offer past.

'They think he fell down the stairs, but he had bruises around his neck suggesting someone tried to strangle him first,' Shawn thought, his eyes on the man. Aislinn still looked away, keeping her eyes on the crying woman. 'I want to get up there and look around. Or you could just touch the body.' She shook her head sharply and turned to glare at him.

'I'm not going anywhere near that body,' she said, half shouting it in her mind. He winced and frowned, using his free arm to rub his head.

'Fine, fine, lets go upstairs. There has to be a back way up," he thought, and they both turned toward the kitchen, breaking contact, only to find Juliet and Lassiter watching them with odd expressions on their faces.

"Oh hey Lassie, didn't see you there," Shawn said, grinning and half stepping in front of Aislinn in a protective manner, put on guard by their faces. He probably didn't even realize he was doing it, but Aislinn was glad he had. They must have noticed something weird, they wore the same expressions on their faces that the few people who had found out about her back home had worn. Shawn was probably reacting to those memories too, though he probably didn't know it.

"What are you doing here Spencer?" Lassiter asked, and she could see him shift his attention to Shawn, and she left out a sigh of relief. They must be more used to strange things around here than they had been at home.

"I was invited," Shawn said, tucking his hands in his pockets but staying between her and the cops. Aislinn peeked around his shoulder to see Lassiter glaring at Juliet who just shrugged. Now that both of them were distracted she stepped around Shawn and walked along the wall toward the kitchen.

"It's his case too," she could hear Juliet saying. Evidently they hadn't noticed her departure, though she was sure Shawn had. Sure enough, there was a hallway on the other side of the kitchen. She took it, making sure not to touch anything. She really didn't want to see a murder happen, though she was sure she would see it at some point. Shawn caught up to her at the top of the stairs.

"Sorry about them," he said, grinning. "They both still think I'm a fake so it scares them to see something actually happen. Jules it looked like we were having a conversation without talking."

"Well we were," Aislinn said, shrugging.

"Don't worry about them," he said, resting a hand on her shoulder. She assumed it was supposed to be comforting, and it was a little. "They aren't like those people in your memories." She gave him a small smile.

"I know," she said. following him to the top of the other staircase. He looked around, pointing out a footprint in the carpet at the top of the stairs.

"That's a print from a mans shoe," he said, kneeling down by it to look at it better. "It's too small to be Mr. Daniels, and the butler said no one's been up here since the death besides the wife."

"Maybe she just has big feet," Aislinn commented, and Shawn chuckled.

"No, she wears size 8 in women's," he said, tilting his head to the side, then scowling. She squatted down beside him and rested her hand over the footprint, letting the memories flow through her. "You don't have to do that. I know you don't want to see a murder."

"I'll have to sooner or later," she muttered, focusing on the images. She gasped, then stood. "It was the butlers brother. He's in love with the mistress," she said, then shook her head. "He tried choking him, but the guy fought back so he pushed him down the stairs." She tried to keep her voice even. She hadn't actually seen the death, just the man tumbling down the stairs. "He forgot to take the security tape."

"This is one twisted little family," Shawn said, grinning.

"Wait there's more," Aislinn said. She had rested her hand on the banister as she stood and gotten a flash of something. "He's still here. He dropped something in the scuffle and didn't realize it until he was outside. His wallet," she said, looking around her. "There," she pointed to the edge of a leather flap sticking out from under the table. She felt a little sick, she had seen more of the murder from the touch on the banister, but she tried not to think about it.

"Awesome," Shawn said, then frowned. "Are you alright?"

"Fine," she said. "I just want some fresh air. You can wrap this up on your own right?"

"Sure," he said as they made their way back to the other stairway. "Do you know where the guy is hiding?"

"He's waiting in one of the outbuildings. Maybe the one by the pool? Not sure," she said.

"Great," he said as they came to a stop near the front doors. Aislinn turned to go back to the car, hearing Shawn start a 'vision' behind her. It only took them about ten minutes to find the boy in the pool shed and get him into a squad car.

By that afternoon Aislinn, with the help of Gus and Shawn, had moved all her things up into her new apartment, only about twenty minutes away from the Psych office, and less than ten minutes from the police station, Shawn's apartment, and Gus's apartment. Gus had lent her an air mattress to sleep on until they went furniture shopping, which they were planning on doing that weekend, which was fine by Aislinn, the air mattress was comfortable enough.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter Three

The next morning Aislinn awoke to her phone ringing, but by the time she had picked it up it had stopped ringing. The sun was up, but she wasn't used to the surroundings enough to guess what time it was by the sun, so she squinted her eyes at her phone, then sat up quickly. It was nearly ten, she had slept in much later than she normally would. Using her gift, on purpose, had exhausted her. She had fallen asleep as soon as her and the boys had finished moving her things up to the apartment. She stood up slowly, looking around to figure out where she had put her bag of cloths the night before, but was distracted as her phone beeped again, letting her know that someone had left her a voicemail. She listened to it as she hunted through her duffle bag, trying her hardest to keep from laughing at the message. Shawn and Gus had called her to meet them at the station, but they were fighting over the phone and talking over each other so it took them three times as long as it should have to get to the point. She pulled on jeans and a long sleeved shirt, sliding her gloves on too out of habit. Just because she had sort of figured out how to block out the images didn't mean she wanted to get flashes from everything she touched.

She made it to the police station in less than ten minutes since traffic was light, and circled the lot once to look for Gus's car, but she must have beat them there. She parked and went inside the building and found a bench near the door to wait for them. Her eyes flicked from person to person as she waited. And waited. After about an hour and three unanswered calls to Shawn and Gus she was about ready to leave. She glanced towards the clock for the fourth time in the last five minutes only to see Juliet standing in her view with her hands on her hips looking at Aislinn. Aislinn smiled tentatively as the blonde walked over to her. She wasn't sure what to make of the woman, Juliet had seemed a little wary of her the last time they had talked, but she was smiling now.

"Hey," Juliet said as she approached. Aislinn stood.

"Um, hi," she said, clasping her hands together in front of her.

"I couldn't help but notice that you've been sitting here for an hour. What are you doing here?" Juliet asked, raising an eyebrow. Aislinn looked down as she spoke, hoping she wasn't about to get into trouble for something.

"Well, Shawn called me an hour ago saying it was really urgent for me to meet him and Gus here," she said, shrugging.

"He called you because I told him that as a new employee we need to get you a pass and everything so you can come into the station with them," Juliet said exasperatedly. "I called him this morning to let him know. It's not urgent though, but you can fill out the paperwork while you wait if you want."

"What paperwork?" Aislinn asked, looking up now, a frown on her face.

"Well just the normal stuff, like name, address, phone number, and probably a background check of some sort, I'm not really sure actually," Juliet said as she led Aislinn over to the front desk and picked up a clipboard and some papers.

"Why a background check?" Aislinn asked, trying to keep her voice even. She didn't really have anything to hide, but she didn't want people she didn't know poking around her life.

"Well we do background checks on everyone who works at or with the department," Juliet said, handing the clipboard to Aislinn. "I need to get back to work. Once you're done with these just bring them back to the front desk and you can go."

"Thanks," Aislinn said, accepting the papers and returning to her bench. She worked her way through the paperwork slowly, though it was mostly general things like current information and job history and schooling.

Once Aislinn had her pass hanging around her neck, she wandered around slowly, trying to remember where everything in the station was. She passed a few cops she didn't recognise, but since no one told her she wasn't allowed to be there she figured her wandering was fine.

"Aislinn!" She heard someone call behind her. Only Shawn would be that loud in the station. She turned to face him, frowning as he and Gus came to a stop in front of her. "Oh good, you got your pass. We might have a case. Come along." He tugged her across the room by her arm and she followed quietly, listening as he pointed things out. She remembered where Detective Lassiter's desk was from her last visit, and where Juliet's was, but he didn't stop until they were right outside the Chiefs office. There were four people inside, but Aislinn was in the wrong position to make them out.

"That's Nigel St. Nigel," Gus whispered as they peered through the blinds. "He's one of the judges on American Duos." He continued, seeing Shawn open his mouth in confusion. Aislinn nodded, she had seen the show a few times when there was nothing better on. It wasn't very good. "Shawn I told you I didn't want the show spoiled before I could watch it!" Gus continued to complain as Shawn opened the door and led them inside. Aislinn stood in the back of the room, not really sure what to do. Now she could see that the other people in the room were the chief, Lassiter, and Juliet.

"This is them?" Nigel asked in a snide voice as he looked Shawn and his over as they continued to argue about the importance of the show. Aislinn frowned at his tone. After seeing pretty much all of shawms memories, most of which included Gus, she felt protective of them. Like they were her little brothers of something, which they certainly acted like a lot of the time. She stepped around them, forming her mouth into an obviously fake smile as she approached the desk.

"Hello. I'm Aislinn. It's nice to meet you," she said, holding her hand out to the man. The chief raised an eyebrow but the boys just continued to argue. Nigel ignored her hand and she let it drop after a few seconds.

"I'm sure it is," he said snidely, a smirk on his face. "The answer is no," he continued, turning back to the chief.

"I have to agree ma'am," Aislinn said, also turning to the chief. "We don't take cases that include pompous jack asses." The room fell silent as they waited for the Chiefs response. She knew Shawn and Gus would take the case anyway, but this man seriously irked her.

"Hm." Nigel said, turning back to her with his brows raised in surprise. "I like her. Very well." He turned back to the chief. Aislinn smiled a tiny smirk as she stepped back to stand beside Shawn and Gus. Shawn rested a hand on her arm, his fingers poking underneath the end of her sleeve to find the skin above her gloves just long enough to let her know he approved of her antics before he let his hand fall to his side.

"Nigel needs protection," Juliet began, a small smile on her face too.

"You realise you're in a police station?" Shawn said looking around them in an obvious manner. Nigel rolled his eyes.

"I don't trust the police," Nigel said, shrugging. "No offence," he said insincerely to the chief.

"None taken," she said, though her mouth had tightened a little.

Aislinn tuned out the rest of the conversation, he attention caught by the silent Lassiter as he glared at them through the office windows from his desk. He had been looking her over with narrowed eyes while the others had talked, and Aislinn itched to go touch his hand or something so she could know what he was thinking about her. From his expression it probably want anything good.

"I already have a plan," Shawn said, drawing Aislinn's attention back to the conversation. She tilted her head as she looked at him.

"Well what is it?" Nigel asked after a few moments of silence.

"I thought you wanted us to be stealth," Shawn said, grinning. Nigel rolled his eyes.

"Very well," he said, turning back to the chief. Shawn turned to leave the office, Gus and Aislinn following behind him.

"What are you three doing here?" Lassiter asked from behind them as they left the office.

"We can't tell you," Gus said.

"Police business," Aislinn added.

"All part of a secret plan," Shawn finished. "I'm sure you understand." He turned and led them away before Lassiter could comment, but his expression told Aislinn he was glad they were leaving.

"Is he always like that to everyone or does he just hate me for some reason?" Aislinn asked, glancing back the way they had come though the hallway was empty now.

"Oh don't worry about Lassie. He just acts all prickly but really he's a soft teddy bear," Shawn said as he practically bounced toward the door.

"Just don't let him hear you saying that," Gus added. "I'm still convinced that he will shoot you one day." Shawn just shook his head but didn't respond.

Aislinn rode with them back to the Psych office, leaving her car in the lot at the police station.

"So what's your plan? Do you even have a plan?" Gus asked once they were safely inside the office.

"Of course I have a plan," Shawn said, flopping into his chair. Aislinn settled into one of the arm chairs in front of the TV as Gus flipped it on to the latest episode of American Duos. "How well can you sing Aislinn?"

"I don't sing. Or do stage performances," Aislinn said, watching the two people in the screen.

"Okay. Gus, I think it's time," Shawn said dramatically. Gus waved his hand for silence, his eyes glued to the screen. "Gus!" Shawn continued to whine until Gus paused the show and turned to glare at Shawn. Shawn grinned. "We are going to be on American Duos!" Gus stared at him blankly for a few seconds, and Aislinn thought he might refuse, but then his eyes grew excited and he began to bounce in his seat. Aislinn rolled her eyes and took the remote from Gus as the two began to plan their outfits and which song they should sing.

"Children," she muttered under her breath, then changed the channel to something more interesting to watch.

Aislinn stood backstage at the American Duos first round dressed all in black like the other stage hands. This round wasn't televised and there was no live audience, but all the stage hands were in full dress rehearsal mode. As a newbie, she had been positioned near the curtain cables with the clear instructions to pull the rope to close the curtains only during the 'commercial break' which for today meant only when the judges took a break. It also meant she had little to do besides stand off he the side of the stage with a clear view of both the stage and the judges. To her, this was the perfect undercover surveillance post. She had seen Shawn and Gus verify that morning, but they were now out in the main hall with the hundreds of other contestants as they waited their turn. Aislinn hadn't protested their plan only because she knew she would be wasting her breath to do so. She also knew that Shawn had his own way of doing things. From what she had observed so far, besides Nigel, the other judges seemed like idiots, though she personally classified Nigel in that category too. The woman was too high on drugs to know what was going on and the other man didn't have anything to say about anyone. There was the stage manager, Aislinn hadn't heard his name, but he was very obnoxious. She avoided him.

When she got bored she shed one of her gloves and began touching various things within her area, practicing her control over the flow of information coming into her brain. By the time Shawn and Gus came into the stage, Aislinn had learned a lot about the stage hands and people working the show, but she hadn't seen anything to help tell her who was behind the attacks on Nigel. She had learned that nearly everyone hated him though, which still didn't give her any ideas. She covered her hand with her mouth as Shawn and Gus began their routine. She knew Juliet was lurking somewhere on the other side of the stage and she moved to see what the other woman thought of the horrible singing. Aislinn covered her mouth as she took in the shocked look on Juliet's face. Juliet caught her eyes and the two of them grinned at each other for a second before Aislinn turned back to her place beside the ropes. She shook her head as Nigel forced the two idiots thorough to the next round.

"Pst, Aislinn," Shawn half whispered half spoke as he and Gus leaned around the doorframe between the back stage and a hallway. She turned to them, then glanced around her. Seeing no one, she went through the door, leaving it open a crack behind her so she could get back in later.

"What?" She asked once they were all in the empty hallway. "Did you figure out who rigged the light to fall?"

"Not yet, we are going up there now to look around. You coming?" Shawn asked, his voice still in a whisper. Aislinn glanced around, then lifted the black hood on her sweater to cover her hair. She followed them up the maintenance stairs to the metal footpath above the auditorium, then to the area above the judges table where the light had fallen from. She rested her ungloved hand on the metal railings but didn't get anything from the vision.

"Shawn, whoever did it must have worn gloves, I'm not seeing anything," she whispered, then glanced down. "I need to get back to my post, the next pair will be up soon." She left the way they had come, leaving the two boys to poke around, and got back to her place just in time to see the stage manager guy catch Shawn and Gus. She shook her head, then pulled the rope to open the curtains as the next two singers took the stage. After the first round was over, Aislinn went out back to find Shawn and Gus. She knew the judges all had little resign room trailers behind the building and assumed thats where Shawn and Gus would go.

"How do you expect me to carry you two injured howler monkeys through tomorrow?" Nigel was saying snidely. Aislinn couldn't help but agree with him, even though she disliked him. She supposed that if she'd had to listen to all the people who had been in the first round over and over like he had, she would probably be cynical too.

"Woah," Shawn said, frowning in mock hurt.

"I might have been a little pitchy. I had a dairy-heavy Jamba Juice…" Gus said, then trailed off.

"Stop with the excuses. Step it up. I cannot carry you another round," Nigel said, pulling a metal cigarette case from the robe he was wearing. "I think I preferred the stalker," he mumbled. Shawn had stopped paying attention and was looking around the little lot, frowning. Aislinn followed his gaze, but didn't see what he had been looking at. He held out his arm in front of Nigel, making the man frown.

"Don't," Shawn said, not really paying attention.

"Don't what?" Nigel asked, his voice impatient.

"Um, smoke. Those things can kill you," Shawn said, pacing from one end of the small trailer to the other.

"Well add them to the list," Nigel said, rolling his eyes as he pulled out a lighter.

"Stop!" Shawn said suddenly, wrapping his arms around Nigel. Aislinn might have laughed at the expression on the mans face, but Shawn looked serious so she didn't say anything, just stepped closer as she looked around for the trouble Shawn had seen.

"I do not have physical contact with people with arm hair," Nigel drawled, and Aislinn shook her head. Shawn grabbed the cigarette case from Nigel's hands.

"That case…" he began, but Nigel cut him off.

"Was a gift. A very expensive…" he stopped as Shawn took it and tossed it a few feet to the right of them. It sparked and smoked as it his the small puddle of water. Nigel looked at it for a moment, then fainted. This time, Aislinn did laugh as Shawn went to move the exposed electrical wires out of the water as carefully as possible. Nigel, when he had regained consciousness, insisted on calling the police. Within the hour, cops that Aislinn didn't know had conducted all the contestants, stage workers, judges, and anyone else in or around the building into the police station. She waited with the boys until one of the officers led them into an interrogation room. Shawn seemed to find the whole situation funny, and he was joking with the officer, whom he called McNabb. About ten minutes later, McNabb came back, leading Lassiter, who walked into the room without looking at them.

"'Sup," Gus said when he finally looked up. Aislinn was standing in the back of the room while the boys sat in the chairs, grinning up at Lassiter.

"You're kidding," he said, his expression annoyed. "What were you idiots doing down at that show?"

"We're looking for our big break," Gus said, shrugging.

"I needed a second job," Aislinn added, also shrugging. She did her best to keep her face straight. She could understand why the boys liked to needle Lassiter so much. He was so serious all the time, it was fun to try to make him break.

"Do I get a phone call?" Shawn asked, looking around the room.

"Out," Lassiter said, his expression growing angrier the longer he was there. "I'm trying to conduct an investigation."

"Don't you wanna ask us if we did it?" Shawn asked in mock surprise.

"Ask him," Gus said, crossing his arms over his chest. "I plead the fifth." Shawn gave him a surprised look, then grinned up at Lassiter who was rubbing his temple. Aislinn stepped forward and lifted both of them out of their seats by their arms. They followed with no complaint though they easily could have shaken her off.

"That's enough," she said, grinning at them as the stood and headed to the door.

"Aww," Shawn whined. "But moooom you're ruining all the fun." Aislinn shook her head and followed them up the stairs and out of the station.

"So where to now?" She asked, following them to Gus's car.

"Well, Juliet agreed to be our choreographer," Shawn said.

"What? When?" Gus asked frowning.

"I cornered her while we were waiting for Lassie," Shawn said, smiling.

"Well I'm going to go furniture shopping," Aislinn said, glancing over to her own car. "I'll see you guys tomorrow morning?"

"Sure," Shawn said, getting into the car. "Oh yeah," he said, rolling down the window. "Jules said you were waiting at the station for an hour this morning. Sorry about that."

"It's fine," Aislinn said, smiling too now. "I'll see you tomorrow." She waved to them, then went to her car and used her phone to find a good furniture store nearby. She was on the second floor of her building, so she would have to pay to get the things delivered and just hope they would carry it up the stairs for her. Now that she was working at Psych, and had gotten a portion of the payment from their last case, she didn't feel so bad about dipping into her old family money to furnish her apartment. Not that anyone else could access the money or anything, but she always felt a little bad when she used it. Now she would be able to replace some of what she used. Not that she really needed to. Between the bank accounts of her parents, and both sets of grandparents, and the money she had gotten from selling their house in Wisconsin, she was well enough off to not have to work for the rest of her life and probably still have some left over. That seemed like the boring option to her though. Her life had been more interesting in the last few days since meeting Shawn and Gus than it had been in the entire time before that.

She spent the rest of the evening looking through stores and magazines and ordering the things she liked, then went to a nearby retail store to buy a few more outfits, since most of her clothes consisted of jeans and t-shirts that she had owned since high school.

Aislinn woke to her alarm at seven the next morning, showered, dressed in her all black stage hand outfit, and was at the auditorium at eight sharp when the next group of auditions for the day started. She hadn't expected to see Shawn and Gus that early in the morning, so she made an effort to keep an eye on Nigel while pulling the curtain ropes. She wore her gloves today, not really wanting to get flashes of image that would distract her when there was supposedly a killer on the loose, but she may as well have not even been there. There was nothing unusual about anything that she could see. It was actually extremely boring and she found herself wishing she had brought headphones or something to listen to music that wasn't sung off key or at the wrong tempo.

When they all broke for a two hour lunch break Aislinn followed Nigel back to his hotel round the corner staying about half a block behind him to see if anyone else was following. She didn't notice anyone. At the hotel she spotted Shawn and Gus and went to join them as they followed Nigel up to his room.

"You left me alone for half the day," Nigel was saying as she caught up to them. "You'll never make it as body guards."

"We aren't body guards," Shawn said as Nigel opened his hotel door.

"You'll never make it as anybody," Nigel said, leaving the door open for them to follow him inside. Aislinn looked around the room silently, just to make sure there wasn't someone hiding somewhere. She even checked under the low bed though the person would have had to been pretty despite to squeeze themselves into an area that small.

"You weren't alone anyway," Shawn said, peering around the room. Aislinn could tell when he noticed something that might be important because his face scrunched up a little. "Aislinn was there the whole morning."

"Ah yes, the only sane one in your little group is a 90 pound girl. I feel so safe," Nigel said sarcastically.

"Actually I weigh 107 pounds," Aislinn corrected absentmindedly as she glanced out of the window. "I'm also a black belt in karate."

"Exactly," Shawn said, winking at her. "Safe and sound. Whataya got there?"

Nigel had seated himself at a small table with a covered plate and had tucked his napkin into his shirt collar.

"My standing order," he said, smirking as he lifted the top off of some kind of sandwich and began putting salt on it. Shawn frowned, then stepped closer.

"Wait," he said, grabbing the sandwich out of Nigel's hands. Nigel frowned.

"Give it back," he said, reaching for the sandwich half. Aislinn nearly laughted as Shawn replied with a no, mocking Nigel's accent. He threw the sandwich to the other side of the table.

"What is it with you and throwing things?" Nigel asked as he picked up the other half of the sandwich sullenly.

"Don't eat that!" Shawn said as Gus came over to stand beside him. Aislinn stood back a bit, but was watching carefully to see what Shawn had seen.

"Why the devil not?" Nigel asked, looking down at the sandwich.

"Because I'm getting a very sting feeling about this sandwich," Shawn said, lifting his hand to his temple in his typical 'vision' stance. "It's-"

"Delicious?" Gus interrupted.

"No," Shawn said.

"Herb crusted?" Aislinn added, raising an eyebrow.

"No," Shawn said, getting impatient. He hit Gus's arm as Nigel rolled his eyes. "It's not from the hotel kitchen."

"And?" Nigel asked, still holding the sandwich.

"And," Shawn said, finally getting to the point. "It's poisoned." Nigel dropped the sandwich onto it's plate and held his hands up while making some sort of protesting noise. Aislinn leaned over to peer closer at the sandwich but couldn't see anything odd about it. She pulled off one of her gloves and touched the bread, assuming that the poison had to be ingested since both Nigel and Shawn had touched it and seemed to be fine. She got flashed of an industrial bakery, a storage warehouse, a truck and a store, but nothing useful.

"Whoever made the sandwich wore gloves," she said, shaking her head.

"Well at least they were observing proper health and safety procedures," Gus said.

After the nights set of auditions was over, Aislinn, Shawn, and Gus went to the police station to start sorting through all the information on all the contestants, employees, and anyone else near the building from the other day while the police checked through Nigel's room for any evidence. Aislinn had led the room where the man was staying after only half an hour, not willing to stay near him if it wasn't necessary. She had been hiding out at an unused desk waiting for Lassiter and Juliet to come back with the toxicology report on the sandwich while she went through the statements from some of the people. She jumped up as Lassiter walked past and grabbed her files to join him.

"Well it looks like your idiot boyfriend was right, it was poisoned," Lassiter said as they walked toward the conference room the others were in. Aislinn rolled her eyes.

"I'd never go out with Shawn. He's too childish. I'd end up killing him within a day," she said, walking quickly to keep pace with the taller detective.

"I'll help you hide the body," Lassiter mumbled and she laughed in surprise, not having ever heard him make any kind of joke before, as he pulled open the conference room door. She stayed near it as he approached the table and discussed the sandwich.

"Your hotel detail couldn't even handle one room," Nigel said in a snide voice to the chief.

"Well they aren't the ones out ordering room service with a big target on their head," Aislinn said snippily. She was loosing patience with this man. No wonder someone wanted to kill him, he was a complete asshole.

"It was a standing order," Nigel argued, but he did look a little subdued.

"We are almost through with the screen of your room Mr. St. Nigel," the chief said, interrupting the arguing. "You can return when we clear it."

"Fantastic," Shawn said, setting down a hand of cards. Aislinn frowned at him. Had he even gone through any of the files? Probably not. "Because to be honest, Gus and I have slightly more pressing issues at the moment. We need to rehearse," the two of them stood and made their way toward Aislinn, each of them grabbing one of her arms on the way out of the room.

"I really dislike that guy," Aislinn said as they walked down the hallway. "If we find this murderer theres just going to be someone else in line behind him."

"Well we only need to find one of them. Once he;s out of town he can find someone else to keep him alive," Shawn said as they walked toward the exit.

"How did you know that sandwich didn't come from the kitchen?" Gus asked and Aislinn glanced over her shoulder to make sure no one was listening.

"Easy. There were only 83 sesame seeds on his bun. All the other ones from the hotel have 87," Shawn said and Aislinn rolled her eyes.

"Are you serious?" Gus said sounding impressed.

"No," Shawn said, rolling his eyes. "The other ones had swords, Nigel's had tooth picks. Im not rain man Gus."

"You sing like rain man," Gus said, and they paused int he hallway to appreciate the reference. Aislinn walked past them before she realized they had stopped walking, only to find her way blocked by Lassiter.

"Spencer, you missed something," he said, a smug look on his face. "We found prints."

"Was he in a little red corvette?" Shawn asked.

"Under the cherry moon?" Aislinn added, grinning. Lassiter rolled his eyes.

"Finger prints," he said angrily. All three of them made an 'oh I understand now' face which seemed to make Lassiter even angrier. "They belong to Emilina Saffron. So do the drugs we found in the food. We cross referenced them with her prescriptions and her medical records. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm gonna go get a warrant." He pushed his way past Aislinn, then between the boys. Shawn looked after them with a confused look on his face.

"Emilina?" He said, as though not believing it. He shrugged and left the station, the other two following him out.

* * *

"So Nigel is staying at your dad's house now?" Aislinn asked the next afternoon.

"Yep," Shawn said, leading them through the front doors of the hotel the judges were staying at.

"And they are still doing the show even though Emilina's in the hospital?" Asilinn asked. Shawn nodded. "So I can't quit my stage hand job yet?"

"No way," Shawn said, leading them into an elevator. "You are so good at pulling the ropes at the right time. What would they do without you?" Aislinn rolled her eyes as the elevator dinged and opened to an empty hallway. She was the first one out and headed around the corner, thinking they were going to Nigel's old hotel room to look at the explosion. She got to the door, then frowned, noticing that Shawn and Gus weren't behind her anymore. She backtracked and found them sidling along the wall.

"Huh, no guard," Shawn said, looking down the hallway.

"We did all that sneaking around because you thought there might be a guard outside of Emilina's empty hotel room?" Gus asked incredulously. Aislinn rolled her eyes as Shawn pulled out a key card and unlocked the door. The three of them spent a few minutes looking around the hotel room and the bathroom, but they didn't find anything.

"Thats what you get for drinking whole milk Shawn," Gus said, making Aislinn turn around. Shawn was on his hands and knees, peering into the toilet.

"My bones are like granite, Gus," he said as the two of them came over to see what he was looking at. He stood up and pointed."Reach in there and get it."

"No way," Gus said.

"I found it, you get it, that's how it works," Shawn said.

"I'm not reaching my hand into Emelina's toilet water Shawn," Gus said, crossing his arms.

"Aislinn?" Shawn asked.

"No thanks," she said. Shawn sighed then pulled out his phone an pretended to have a vision to Juliet. They went down to the lobby to wait for her to arrive, then Shawn and Gus led her up to the hotel room while Aislinn went back to the auditorium for the beginning of round two. This round would be fully televised, unlike most of the first round.

Halfway through the performances, she spotted Shawn and Gus creeping around backstage and went over to them.

"Hey," she whispered. "Whats going on?"

"We solved it," Shawn whispered back, grinning. "You want to come out with us and reveal the big finale?"

"No thanks, I'd get fired," she said, rolling her eyes. "There's so much for me to do this round, what with having the lights on the stage instead of a curtain. I get to stand around back stage and do nothing, and I'm getting paid minimum wage to do it."

"Nice," Shawn said, holding up a fist for her to bump. She rolled her eyes, but bumped it anyway. "No help me make a commotion."

They looked around and spotted a table full of empty paint cans. Shawn and Gus looked at each other, then they both looked at Aislinn in question. She shrugged and followed them over. Shawn pretended to stumble into the table, making most of the cans fall loudly and roll across the stage. They picked up a few and threw them out too, just to make more noise. The pair singing stopped as Shawn and Gus pretended to stumble out onto the stage. Aislinn stood back, shaking her head, but smiled anyway.

"Please, accept our apologies," Gus began, and Aislinn positioned herself so she could see the chief and the cops she had brought with her. The chief was rubbing her forehead and Shawn and Gus interrupted the show. Aislinn could relate. Half the time, the boys gave her a throbbing headache, but half the time she welcomed the childlike behavior. "We just thought you would all like to know that you're in the presence of a homicidal sociopath," Gus continued. The two that had been sining looked at each other, then the taller one shook his head.

"No, no, no, he's not crazy," he said in a southern accent. "We got a doctors note and everything." Aislinn shook her head.

Shawn continued to walk through the whole case, and Lassiter and Juliet came in with the guy Aislinn assumed had been behind it. She almost wished Shawn had told her who was behind it, but this was better than a tv show. She grinned when they got the third judge to confess everything, almost surprised it had works. Nigel continued to ridicule him as some cops held the man back and Aislinn shook her head again. If that guy ever got out of jail he would just be that much angrier at Nigel. She almost wished he would get out soon, this guy was a complete jerk. At least after today she wouldn't have to deal with him ever again, or so she hoped.

The cops took the two almost murders back to the station, but the stage manager wanted to continue the second round. She stood back stage as the other contestants did their bits, two at a time, until it was Shawn and Gus's turn. They had some elaborate routine planned, and Juliet had come to watch as well. The two women stood next to each other through the song, and Aislinn had to admit that they had improved quite a bit, though they still sort of sucked.

Nigel, as the only judge left, voted them off immediately, and Aislinn laughed as they came off the stage, knocking things over int heir anger.

"Better luck next time guys," Juliet said, patting Shawn's shoulder.

"Come on, lets get milkshakes. I'm buying," Aislinn said, leading the other three to the stage door exit. Shawn and Gus looked mildly happier to be getting ice cream, and Juliet came along without complaint.


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter Four

"Aislinn! Aislinn! Aislinn!" Aislinn stared at the door of her apartment for a few seconds, deliberating between opening it for Shawn or pretending she wasn't home. She had been in the new place for almost a month now, and her new furniture had been delivered throughout the last two days, most of it unassembled, and all of it definitely not put where she wanted it, and though they had promised to help, Gus was too busy between his real job and Psych, and Shawn had been making excuses to not help her put it together. The only reason he would have to be here now was if there was a new case. She sighed, stood from her one armchair, and opened the door mid knock, almost getting hit in the face. Shawn grinned at her, shoved a blueberry muffin and a coffee into her hands, then pushed past her into the apartment. She kicked the door shut behind her and turned to face him, eyebrow raised.

"You got a computer!" Shawn said, grinning over at a large box containing the pieces of a bookshelf where her computer was resting, playing music as background noise. Shawn glared at it for a moment, then shut the top of her laptop, cutting off the music. "What the hell was that? Soft jazz?"

"I like it. It's soothing," Aislinn said, scowling.

"Yeah, soothing and boring," Shawn said, rolling his eyes and looking around him. "I love what you've done with the place," he said, taking a seat in the armchair Aislinn had just vacated. She rolled her eyes and took a sip of the coffee, then made a face. It was plain black coffee, which she normally preferred, but it was very bad coffee… probably from a gas station. She set the cup down on a waist high box as she passed it.

"Well it would be a lot faster going if my friends weren't avoiding helping me put it all together," she said, raising an eyebrow at him.

"Sorry I can't," he said, standing and clapping his hands together. "I have an old sports injury."

"Last time it was carpel tunnel in your elbows," she pointed out, picking apart the top of the muffin. She took a bite, then frowned at it. "Do you always buy breakfast from the gas station? I'm not very picky, but this stuff is disgusting," she said, setting the muffin next to the coffee.

"Well it was probably better yesterday when I bought it," Shawn said, grinning. "I just popped the coffee in the microwave before I came over. Don't you like it?"

"No," she said straight faced. He grimaced.

"Fine, let's go," he said, heading to the door.

"Go where?" Aislinn asked, grabbing her phone and keys and jacket as she passed them on her way towards the door.

"To get a real breakfast," Shawn said in an obvious tone. Aislinn sighed but followed him out to the street.

"It's after noon Shawn," Aislinn pointed out as the reached the sidewalk.

"Breakfast for lunch should be how everyone eats," Shawn said, turning right and walking down the street a ways, then frowning, turning around, and walking the other way down the street. Finally he stopped and turned to look at her. "Which one is your car?"

"Oh I see. You just came down here because you need a ride somewhere," Aislinn said, but pointed to her car. Shawn grinned and opened the door, sliding in to the passengers seat.

"Of course not," Shawn said as Aislinn got into the car. "My motorcycle is right over there," he said, pointing.

"That's a no parking zone Shawn," Aislinn said, glancing into her mirrors before pulling out into traffic.

"It's fine, I've got my ambassador flags," he said, kicking his feet up onto the dashboard.

"Get your feet off the dash," Aislinn said, jerking the wheel to the left a little to make his feet slide off. "Now where are we going?"

"Turn left a the next light," Shawn said when he had finished pouting at her for knocking his feet down. "Okay, right up here, then left again at the next light."

"Are we going to the beach?" Aislinn asked, glancing up at the overcast sky. "It's not really the right weather for that."

"We aren't going swimming," Shawn said, rolling his eyes again. "Okay, park here. Lets go for a walk."

"Oh, a walk on the beach," Aislinn said sarcastically. "How romantic. Will there be a picnic and rose petals?"

"Oh shut up," Shawn said, fronting at her. She laughed. "Come on," he said, grabbing her hand to pull her along.

"Oh we even get to hold hands?" Aislinn said in a fake girly voice. "I hope you know that I'm a respectable girl and I don't put out on the first date." Shawn twisted his hand around so instead of dragging her by her wrist, he was properly holding hands with her, then he swung their hands between them like children did in grade school because they were too awkward to actually hold hands. Aislinn laughed.

"Technically this is our third date," Shawn said, grinning.

"Was I asleep for the first two? You know that's illegal right?" Aislinn said in a grave voice.

"No, first we had the case of the missing books, then we had the case of who tried to kill the jerk," Shawn said as they crested a small hill of sand. She saw the red and blue lights from the police cars before she saw the small crowd gathered around on of the docks.

"Shawn, I'm going to give you a little advice for the future," Aislinn said in a serious voice as they approached the dock. "Crime scenes do not count as dates." Shawn gasped dramatically and dropped her hand.

"Blaspheme," he said, holding a hand to his heart. "Of course they do."

"Shawn!" a voice called behind them. They turned to see Gus walking down from a much closer parking lot than the one they had parked in. "So what's this new case we got?"

"Um, slight error in grammar there buddy," Shawn said. Aislinn stood back from them and the detectives. She glanced at the body once, then away, frowning. She did like the mystery part of solving cases but she really didn't like the whole dead body part. She just hoped that Shawn wouldn't ask her to touch it. She had left in too much of a hurry to grab her gloves, and now she was subconsciously pulling her long jacket sleeves over her hands.

"What part?" Gus asked, frowning.

"Got," Shawn said, flipping through the papers of Lassiter's notes. Aislinn stepped forward to look over his shoulder, but he flipped through them much faster than she could read. She grabbed the papers from his hands letting the flashed of information flow through her mind, then handed them back. "Did you get anything off those?"

"Just that whoever wrote the notes definitely thinks it was a fishing accident of some kind, and that they really had to go to the bathroom," Aislinn said. "But I have all the notes up here now," she said, tapping her head.

"Thats a nice trick," Shawn said, grinning.

"I came all the way down here from the office Shawn," Gus said in a whiney voice. Lassiter began looking around him as he realized he didn't have the notes.

"Gus, don't be a giant snapping turtle," Shawn said. "We'll have a case in like five minutes." Lassiter spotted Shawn reading the notes and stalked over to them, grabbed the notes, then stalked back to the body. Aislinn giggled as Shawn stood there looking lost for a few seconds, then followed him, ducking under the crime scene tape. Gus and Aislinn followed after a slight pause.

"Nobody can explain these puncture woulds," the chief was saying. Aislinn stood back as Shawn and Lassiter bent to look over the body. "We can't rule out an animal attack." Aislinn glanced once at the body, then took a few steps back, looking over the rest of the area. She wandered around the deck supports, returning in time to see Shawn furiously scribbling on a yellow piece of paper. He rambled on a bit about art skills before showing them all a drawing of a dinosaur. Aislinn laughed a little, knowing that Shawn probably had a reason for doing something so stupid after a month of not having any cases and patted him on the back as the cops, and Gus, walked away from him.

"I thought it was a good drawing," she said consolingly. Shawn continued to pout. "Really, with a few art classes you could probably be decent." He scowled at her and walked off. She followed at a slower pace.

"Aislinn!" Shawn called to her when she reached the parking lot. "I'm going back to the Psych office with Gus."

"What about your motorcycle?" She asked, frowning at him.

"You can bring it over," he said, tossing her the keys.

"Shawn!" She said as he got into Gus's car. He rolled down the window. "I don't have a motorcycle license."

"Then don't get pulled over," he said. She stepped back as Gus pulled away from the parking lot. She sighed. She had absolutely no idea how to ride a motorcycle, but maybe she could learn how to from the memories she could get from it when she touched it, like the notes. She had never tried to use that before, but it seemed like as good a time as any to test it out. She drove back to her apartment in silence, parking in her usual place on the side of the road, and approached the motorcycle slowly, half expecting it to fall over when she touched it. It didn't, and she climbed on carefully, using one foot to balance it and the other to push back the kickstand and she had seen Shawn do in his memories. She waited until the flash of information stopped flowing in front of her eyes before she turned the key, put it into numeral, and flipped the kill switch to start, copying the movements she saw in her memories. Then she squeezed the clutch with her left hand and pushed the start button with her right, and nearly jumped as the motor kicked to life. She let go of the clutch slowly, half watching the images of the bike stalling when Shawn had released it too quickly. She grinned as it stayed running and fitted her feet into their proper places. She slid on the helmet Shawn had left hanging on the handle and secured the strap, then leaned forward and squeezed the throttle. Aislinn was much more excited than she was scared now. She turned the bike out onto the road and drove, probably much slower than Shawn did, to the Psych office, luckily having no mishaps on the way. she arrived just in time to see Shawn coming out of the office. She took of the helmet and shook her hair over her shoulders and grinned at him.

"I love this motorcycle," she said, and he grinned back.

"I know, it's great. Come on, we are going to my dads," he said, grabbing the helmet from her and putting it on.

"Shouldn't I have a helmet too?" Aislinn asked, getting off the bike.

"Only the driver has to wear one," he said, getting on and patting the seat behind him. She climbed on and grinned as he started the bike, much faster than she could have done. She wrapped her arms around his waist as he began driving, also much faster than she would have done. It was too loud to talk while they were in traffic, so she wasn't sure why they were going to his dads house, and by the time they got there her hair was tangled horribly. She finger combed it as she followed him up the pathway to the front door, then she smoothed a hand over her shirt and jeans, hoping that she looked presentable. She knew from Shawn's memories that he didn't really get along with her dad, but she also know that Shawn loved his dad and would never say so. He knocked on the door and they waited a few moments before it opened.

"Shawn," his dad said, frowning.

"Hello dad," Shawn said, pushing past his dad into the house.

"Hello Mr. Spencer," Aislinn said, smiling politely. She tucked her hands behind her back.

"Uh, hi," he said. "Shawn, who's this and what are you doing here?" He turned and walked into the house, leaving the door open behind him, so Aislinn took that as an invitation to follow him in. She shut the door behind her, then would the two men in the kitchen.

"That's Aislinn," Shawn said, grinning. "She sours for Psych. She's a psychic." Shawn's dad rolled his eyes. "Aislinn, this is my dad Henry. He doesn't believe in psychics."

"With a child like you I can't understand why," she said in an innocent voice, catching the apple Shawn tossed at her. She set it back on the counter he had grabbed it from. She saw Henry glance at Shawn in question, then saw Shawn nod and knew his father was silently asking him if she knew he was a fake. Henry sighed and ran a hand over the top of his head. "I need to borrow your truck."

"What for?" Henry asked, glancing at Aislinn out of the corner of his eye.

"We are robbing a bank and I didn't want the getaway car to be trailed back to Gus," Shawn said, grinning.

"What are you really doing?" Henry asked, not amused.

"I need to borrow Gus's giant dinosaur head from fifth grade and take it to the station. For a case," Shawn said.

"And what do I get out of this?" Henry asked, crossing his arms.

"I dunno dad," Shawn said, sighing. "What do you want?"

"I want you to get all your junk lout of my attic," Henry said.

"Great. I'll be over right after we solve this case to do that," Shawn said, holding his hand out in front of him, palm up. Henry sighed but gave him the keys anyway.

"Thanks dad," Shawn said, grinning again and heading back to the door. "Come along Aislinn."

"It was nice to meet you Mr. Spencer," Aislinn said as they left the house.

Shawn drove down the street for about five seconds before slamming on the breaks.

"Really Shawn?" Aislinn asked, her feet slipping off the dashboard where they had been resting.

"Payback," he said, then got out of the truck. Gus's parents house was only one street over from Shawn's dads place. She followed him up the steps, then waited as he knocked on the door. A short, slightly plump, well dressed woman answered the door, grinning at Shawn. She pull shim into a hug and he awkwardly patted her back. Aislinn smirked at him over the woman's shoulder, than smiled politely as the woman pulled back from him.

"Shawn, what a nice surprise," the woman said, and Shawn grinned at her. "Please come in."

"Actually Mrs. Guster, we are in a bit of a hurry. I was hoping I could borrow Gus's dinosaur model, it's very important," Shawn said formally. Aislinn nearly laughed.

"Oh of course," she said, smiling. "I've nearly thrown that thing out hundreds of times, but you know how Gus gets. And who's this young lady?"

"This is Aislinn. She works with us sometimes," Shawn said, and Aislinn jumped as the woman wrapped her up in a hug too, then glared as Shawn laughed silently behind her back.

"It's nice to meet you dear," she said, pulling back from the hug. "Well, it's in the garage," she said, turning back to Shawn and leading them both inside, down a short hall, and through a side door into the garage. "Up there," she said, gesturing to a shelf. Shawn grinned and pulled the giant thing off the shelf as Gus's mom opened the front of the garage for them to leave through.

"Thank you," Shawn called over his shoulder, grinning. Aislinn gave the woman a wave and followed Shawn back to the truck. "Now, to the station," he said, climbing into the drivers seat.

"Good, I've had about as much parent contact as I can handle for one day," Aislinn said, sighing. Shawn smiled and drove them to the station in silence.

"Alright, help me lift this thing," Shawn said, climbing out of the truck.

"You know they aren't going to let you put that thing against the dead guy right?" Aislinn asked, helping Shawn lift the thing onto his head like a giant helmet.

"Only one way to find out," Shawn said, grinning from between the jaws of the dinosaur head. "Come on."

"No thanks, I think I'll wait out here," Aislinn said, shaking her head and leaning against the door of the truck. Shawn shrugged, then walked up the steps to the station, wobbling a little.

She only had to wait about ten minutes before he came back out of the station, two officers escorting him down the steps. She shook her head as he approached.

"Told you so," she said, smiling as she helped him lift the thing off and put it back into the truck.

"I'm edging my way in. Those bruises were definitely caused by something like this," he said, waving his hand over the head, frowning. They climbed back into the truck and drove back to his dads house, making sure to hide the dinosaur head int he garage before entering the house.

"Dad!" Shawn called, pushing the door open. "Dad I brought back your keys." Aislinn closed the door behind her and followed him through the house. They paused int he dining room, seeing Gus at the table eating a piece of pie.

"Hi Gus," Aislinn said. "Hi Mr. Spencer."

"Hey," Gus said around a bite of pie.

"Okay, this is creepy. Why is Gus here?" Shawn said, looking between them.

"What do you think Shawn?" His dad asked, frowning.

"He's a hostage," Shawn suggested as Aislinn stole Gus's fork and took a bite of his pie.

"Perhaps I can shed some light on that," a man said, walking out of the kitchen. Aislinn froze, the fork almost to her mouth and Gus grabbed it back from her, scowling.

"Two hostages," Shawn said, turning back to his father.

"Doug is an old colleague of mine from the force. The chief asked me to have him drop by," Henry said. Shawn frowned again and tossed the truck keys down onto the table.

"Why?" Shawn asked.

"Doug is the department psychologist, Shawn," Henry said, walking around the table.

"I need to take this call," Aislinn said, pulling her silent phone out of her pocket and escaping quickly through the side door that led tot he garage. Once outside, she tucked it back into her pocket and went to lean against the passengers side of Gus's car and wait for them to be finished.

She lifted her head as another car pulled up and Lassiter and the chief got out and went toward the door.

"Sup?" She asked Lassiter as the chief knocked on the door, then opened it. Lassiter just glared so she followed them in.

"Karen, do you mind? We're in the middle of an intervention here," Aislinn heard Henry ask as they walked inside.

"We don't have time for that," the chief said.

"But you're the one who asked for it," Henry replied, frowning.

"And I thank you Henry, but I'm afraid that this can't wait," she said, then turned to Shawn. "We just got a break in the case. We just found out the name of the dead man. You want to tell him who he is, detective?" She gestured behind her to Lassiter, who drew in a breath as though in pain. Aislinn circled around him and the chief to stand beside Shawn.

"No," Lassiter said, shaking his head. The chief turned to glare at him.

"His name was Christopher Franzen," she laughed as though in disbelief. "He is a paleontologist." Shawn raised an eyebrow, then looked over at Aislinn in confusion.

"He studies dinosaurs, Shawn," Aislinn said. He made an 'oh' face, then turned back to them.

"As expected," he said, grinning. "Doug," he said, turning to the psychologist. Aislinn backed away from them, toward the door. "The pleasure was all mine."

"Oh no Shawn, mine," the man said, grinning. Aislinn shook her head, then wandered back around the group to the door to wait outside.

"Aislinn," Shawn said, walking down the steps where she was sitting. "Why are you out here?" She shrugged, standing up as Gus joined them.

"I don't like psychologists," she said, trying to be nonchalant. "They all think I'm insane."

"That isn't surprising," Lassiter said, overhearing their conversation as he followed the chief outside as well. Aislinn frowned and Shawn draped an arm around her shoulder and turned her away from them.

"Come on, lets go down to the station," he said, grinning, though she could feel the tension in his words. She smiled a little to reassure him she was fine.

"Yes, lets," she said, pushing him towards his motorcycle. "I'll ride with Gus." Shawn frowned.

"You like Gus better than me?" He asked, pouting.

"Yes," Aislinn said, keeping her face straight. "I'm sure Gus won't take me to a crime scene for our third date." Shawn huffed and stalked away as Aislinn laughed and went to join Gus in his car.

Instead of going to the station, they went to the Psych office to drop off Shawn's bike, then to the university where the dead guy worked. Aislinn trailed behind the boys as they talked, looking around the campus. She had never gone to college. Not that she wanted to go now, but if she did, this was a nice campus. She caught up with them outside the archeology department and followed them inside. Shawn immediately found a guy to show them around, claiming that he was interested in becoming a student there or something. The department was tiny and underfunded, most of their fossils contained in one display case. She wandered around the shelves of different kinds of rocks and smaller fossils as Shawn and Gus talked to the guy.

"Oh come on," she heard Shawn say and turned to look up form the desk she had been snooping around. "He really is on fire. Aislinn, time to go," he called louder, looking around for her. She had been looking through a notebook and had just found a letter addressed to the dead guy. She tucked it into her jacket pocket and went to follow Shawn out the back way, glancing out the window to see Lassiter and Juliet coming up the walkway to the building.

Once back in the car, she pulled the letter out of her picket and shoved it over her shoulder to Shawn in the back seat. He took it, then grinned.

"Look at you Aislinn, swiping dead peoples mail and everything," Shawn said, turning it over to pull out the contents.

"Calm down, it's just junk mail," she said, recalling the flashes of memory she had gotten from the envelope. "The guy was in a hurry for something when he opened it though. He was really impatient to get out of there. I thought you would want the address."

"Righteo," Shawn said, then directed Gus to the guys house.

"Look at this," Gus said, frowning as they pulled up to the curb. "The cops beat us to the dead guys house," he said, shaking his head as they climbed out.

"I don't know how I feel about the police department being so proactive," Shawn muttered as they walked around the side of the house.

"Feeling the heat?" Gus asked, falling into his 'swag walk'.

"What, you think I'm afraid of a little competition?" Shawn asked, dodging around a cop as he walked.

"I know you are afraid of competition. Why else would you have broken the battle zone at the pizza royale?" Gus said, grinning.

"Dude, you beat me once. And only because you used the eyepiece, and then revealed you and pink eye," Shawn said, frowning. "Lets venture off the beaten path," he said, leading them around the house to a shed. He peered around the door, frowning.

"What's wrong?" Gus asked, frowning too.

"Oh I'm just trying to figure out what to do here since theres a rule that we don't break and enter," Shawn said, and Aislinn snorted.

"What do you mean we don't break and enter?" Gus asked, frowning. "The 24 hour motel, the hotel de la cruise, the spell masters box."

"Yeaaaah," Shawn said, squinting at the key pad for the lock. "But we really shouldn't pick this lock."

"You know I wanna pick that lock," Gus said, glaring at Shawn. Aislinn shook her head, then glanced around to make sure no one was watching them.

"Yes I do," Shawn said, patting Gus on the shoulder and grinning as Gus moved in front of the lock. Gus then proceeded to do some weird noises as he pushed the buttons of the pad and the two of them tried to open the door. All three of them slipped inside.

"I can't see anything," Shawn complained.

"Oh, I got it," Gus said, pulling a tiny flashlight out of his pocket and shining it around, hitting Shawn in the face. Shawn held up an arm and whined as he looked away.

"Gus, that thing is brighter than the sun," Shawn said loudly. Aislinn nervously peered out the crack in the door, watching for people coming this way as the boys looked around. "I think you just gave me glaucoma."

"You can't give someone glaucoma," Gus said, shining the light around the shed. Suddenly the overhead lights came on and Aslinn blinked, then peered around them.

"Thank you," Shawn said impatiently and began shuffling through papers on the desk. "Aislinn, come touch some stuff."

"I'd rather not, Shawn," she said, still keeping watch out the door.

"Wow, this is better than the entire university department," Gus said, looking around.

"Sure is," Shawn said.

"And this is some high quality digging supplies. Looks like some of them are missing," Gus continues, walking further into the shed. "Part of a portable light kit, a lot of brushes, and fine finishing equipment which I'd assume he was only using in the lab." Shawn picked up a photograph of the dead guy but continued going through the things on the table, picking up a dirty piece of thick paper.

"Dude I got something," Shawn said, and Aislinn turned to look too.

"What?" Gus asked, coming closer.

"He was the worst tic tac tow player in the history of the world," Shawn said, holding up a chart with grids and a lot of X's on it. Aislinn rolled her eyes but came closer anyway.

"We're investigating and you're analyzing his doodles?" Gus asked impatiently.

"Actually I'm just standing guard," Aislinn said, smiling.

"Doodles are the window to the soul, Gus," Shawn said, peering at the paper again. Aislinn shook her head and turned back to the door, then frowned.

"We have company," Aislinn said. "Lassiter's here." Shawn refolded the paper and the three of them left the shed, closing the door behind them.

"That guys like five minutes behind us everywhere we go," Shawn grumbled. They watched from around the corner as Lassiter and Juliet tried to open the shed and failed, then they walked around like they had just gotten there.

"Spencer," Lassiter said, frowning. "Enjoying your time riding my behind?" Aislinn snorted and Shawn hit her arm lightly. "This lock is too high tech for a shed. We need to find someone who can crack this code," Lassiter was saying to Juliet.

"There's already someone here who can crack this code," Shawn said, and Gus smirked and made to step forward, only to be held back by Shawn's arm. "That person is Aislinn."

"What?" Aislinn asked at the same time Gus did. Shawn turned to speak to them in an undertone.

"Come on, they need to get used to having her around," Shawn whispered. "Can you open it?" He asked a bit louder.

"Of course I can," Aislinn hissed back, frowning. He grinned, then straightened and gestured for her to step forward.

"Well make yourself useful," Lassiter said sarcastically. She narrowed her eyes at him, then stepped forward to rest her hand over the lock. She got hundreds of images of the dead guy punching the code in, then the most recent one of Gus doing it, and pulled her hand away, frowning slightly.

"As I thought," Lassiter said, seeing her frown. She scowled and reached forward again, punching the numbers in too fast for him to see, then grinned as it clicked open. She pushed on the door and frowned, then gestured for Lassiter to pull it open.

"That was amazing," Juliet said, grinning as she walked through the door.

"I'll give you that one," Lassiter said, almost smiling.

"Sorry Gus," Aislinn said as Shawn followed them into the shed.

"No problem," Gus said, walking inside. Aislinn followed.

"I can't see a thing in here," Lassiter said, peering around.

"Oh I got it," Gus said, pulling his flashlight back out and clicking it on.

"Wait I'm sensing a light switch," Shawn said, then flicked it on. Gus huffed and shined the flashlight right into Shawn's face. Shawn flinched back and pushed Gus's hand away as Aislinn shook her head.

"There are tools missing," Lassiter said, frowning as he looked around.

"Good work detective," Shawn said in a slightly sarcastic voice. Aislinn sighed.

"He had a blunt force trauma," Juliet said, pulling out a small notepad to take notes. "That could be supplied by one of these missing items." the three of them followed the detectives to the back of the shed.

"Maybe this rock hammer, or this medium shovel," Lassiter said, pointing to the empty spaces in the tools rack.

"But where would they be?" Juliet asked, frowning.

"The bed of his pick up," Lassiter said. "It wasn't parked out front or at the university." Gus looked at Shawn who shrugged. Apparently they had all missed that. "We find that truck we find the murder weapon. Let's go O'Hara, we're burning daylight." Lassiter and Juliet turned to leave the shed, Gus and Shawn trailing behind them.

"Man you missed the truck?" Shawn asked, frowning at Gus.

"I'm not the 'psychic'," Gus said as a defense, then turned to Aislinn. "No offense meant."

"Don't worry, I missed it too, but then, I'm not a detective so I have an excuse, what's yours Shawn?" She asked in an overly sweet voice.

"Technically, since you work at Psych, you are a detective," Shawn argued as they made their way back to Gus's car. "My question is, why would someone frequent a fruit stand thats over fifty miles away?" Shawn asked, looking back at the shed. "Did you see those boxes?"

"I did," Aislinn said, nodding. "I didn't know they were important though."

"Everything is important, Aislinn," Shawn said, grinning again as they got into the car.

The next morning they piled into Gus's car and drove out to the fruit stand, singing along to the oldies music for nearly the entire trip. Aislinn had to admit that it was more fun that assembling the furniture in her apartment. She looked around the fruit stand as Shawn and Gus talked to the man running it. After trying the peach Shawn had tossed at her, she shelled out money for a few more of them. They had to be the best peaches she had ever eaten. The three of them drove up the hill the man had directed them to, coming to a stop at a gate that had a no trespassing sign on it.

"Another dead end," Gus said, frowning. "Let's turn around."

"Wait," Shawn said, taking off his seat belt. "Hold on a second." He got out of the car, Aislinn and Gus following him to the gate. "This looks like a place someone's been sneaking into," Shawn said, pointing to the latch on the gate which wasn't secure. They all lifted up on the wire, managing to open the gate enough for them to slip inside one at a time. hey walked up the pathway a ways, looking around them.

"What is this?" Shawn asked.

"It looks like some kind of farmland or something," Gus said, looking around. "Or a grazing plain."

"Oh look at that," Shawn said, pointing to piles of overturned dirt. "It's like that movie. That one with, um, Sigourney Weaver."

"Aliens?" Gus said.

"No," Shawn said, peering around them.

"Alien," Aislinn said, looking around too.

"No," Shawn repeated.

"Alien: Resurrection," Gus said, nodding.

"No the one with the holes and Shia LeBeouf," Shawn said, getting frustrated.

"They had holes in Shia LeBeouf?" Gus asked, frowning.

"No, dude, the holes were int he ground, like that," Shawn said, gesturing to the dirt piles. "And Jon Voight was walking around all crazy."

"Oh," Gus said, nodding in understanding. "Anaconda."

"Yeah, never mind," Shawn said, giving up.

"Gorilla's in the mist?" Gus asked. "Death and the Maiden?"

"No," Shawn said, sighing.

"Half moon street?" Gus asked.

"Just let it go," Shawn said.

"I think it was just called Holes," Aislinn said, then the three of them ducked as a gunshot rang out.

"I'll be damned!" Shawn said as they walked in half crouches to a small stand of trees.

"What?" Gus asked, panicked.

"Somebodys shooting at us!" Shawn said, frowning.

"That's rude," Aislinn said, looking around to see where the shooter was. She had noticed that the bullet hadn't come anywhere near them, so the shooter was probably just trying to warn them off.

"Oh god!" Shawn cried in a mock worried voice. "They're shooting! We're gonna die! Run guys! Run like the wind!" They both tripped over Gus as he stumbled. "No get up!"

They made it back to the car at a run.

"Come on, get in the car! Hurry up!" Gus said, whining.

"Start it, start it, go go go," Shawn said, looking around them. Gus started the car and began backing down the road at a high speed, half crouching over in his seat. "Dude, look at the road while you're driving," Shawn said, smacking Gus on the head.

"I'm staying down for safety," Gus said, making the car swerve.

"He was shooting directly into the air," Aislinn said, rolling her eyes.

"Bullets go up, they have to come down," Gus protested, though he sat a little higher in his seat.

"Do you know what the trajectory would have to be for that to happen?" Shawn argued.

"Don't you dare argue physics with me, not while we're in the process of almost being killed," Gus said, finally getting to a spot on the road where he could turn the car around. "Didn't you see that sign?" Gus whined, pointing to a 'Trespassers will be shot' sign on the side of the drive.

"Oh yeah," Shawn said, relaxing now that they were farther away from the field. "It totally said that, my bad."

Aislinn shook her head and settled in for the hour long ride back to town.

"Aislinn!" Juliet called as the three of them entered the station. They had been on their way to the chiefs office so Shawn could have a 'vision' about the farm. Aislinn looked up at Shawn, silently asking if he needed her to be there. She pushed her shoulder towards Juliet then continued toward the chiefs office. Aislinn warily made her way over to the blonde woman.

"Hi," Aislinn said, not sure what the woman wanted.

"Hey," Juliet said, smiling. "I just wanted to say that it's really nice to have another girl around here, I mean besides the chief. I'm really glad you are working on this case."

"Uh, thanks?" Aislinn said, her words almost forming a question. Her face must have shown her confusion.

"I just wanted to say that it would be nice if we could be, you know, friends," Juliet said, smiling.

"Oh," Aislinn said, then smiled too. "I'd like that. The boys can be kind of…"

"Stupid? Immature? Useless children?" Lasster chimed in from bend her, making her jump. She hadn't noticed him approaching.

"I was going to say overwhelming," Aislinn said, turning to look at him. "So yes, I would like to be your friend," she said, turning back to Juliet.

"Great," Juliet said, grinning. "Maybe we could have lunch together sometime."

"Sure," Aislinn said, smiling.

"Great, well if we are done braiding each others hair and painting each others nails, we have an investigation to continue," Lassiter said, walking toward the chiefs office. Juliet and Aislinn followed behind him, and Aislinn caught Juliet rolling her eyes and grinned at her.

"Lassiter found the paleontologist's truck," Juliet said to her as the entered the office, letting everyone inside overhear it. Aislinn made her way over to stand beside Shawn while the detectives stood in front of the desk.

"You helped," Lassiter conceded, smiling.

"I did help," Juliet said, also smiling. "It was his hunch."

"It was down at the old marina," Lassiter said. "I just had a feeling. I also found the prints of a certain grad student named Eather Robinson along with a stack of letters from said grad student demanding that the professor stop ruining his life. We're sending a car over to pick him up," Lassiter said, then smirked over at Shawn in a mockingly regretful way. "Oh I'm sorry, am I interrupting your trance?"

"I don't buy it," Shawn said, shaking his head.

"Which part?" Lassiter asked, his face smug now. "The damning evidence or the murder weapon?"

"There's more going on in this guys life," Shawn insisted, facing the chief now. "I'm sensing digging." He mimed someone shoveling a pile of dirt over his shoulder.

"Yeah, the archeology department was going under," Lassiter said, nodding. "He was trying to make a big discovery, put him on the map, get more funding."

"The farm," Shawn said, waving his hands about. "I can see the name of the farm. It's wallll… wall… Walker Farms." Lassiter said the end of his sentence with him, nodding along.

"Yeah, we got that lead off the phone records. Yesterday," Lassiter said, looking back at the chief. "Our victim made a series of phone calls to the farmer trying to buy some of his land, but it wasn't for same."

"Farmer was forthcoming, cooperative," Juliet continued. "Definitely not a suspect."

"Anything else?" Lassiter asked, smirking at Shawn.

"I have to say, you have been very thorough," the chief said, nodding in approval.

"We're just doing what any good cops would do," Lassiter said, smirking again. They led the room, Shawn and Gus following behind, then Aislinn. Shawn led them back out to the parking lot, scowling the whole time. He took Gus's keys and climbed into the drivers seat, starting the car as they climbed in.

"Where are we going now?" Gus asked as Shawn pulled out onto the road.

"My dads," Shawn said. The drive only took about five minutes, Shawn speeding the whole way.

"Shawn, what are we doing?" Gus asked as they all climbed out of the car.

"Yeah what are you doing Shawn?" Henry asked, meeting them in the driveway.

"I need to borrow some tools," Shawn said.

"What kind of tools?" Henry asked suspiciously.

"Digging tools," Shawn said. "We've got a little digging project going on."

"Are you still on that dinosaur thing?" Henry asked, following Shawn into the garage.

"We're still on that dinosaur thing?" Gus asked, following behind them.

"What is there an echo in here?" Shawn asked, looking around and grabbing two metal shovels. "Yes, we're still on that dinosaur thing. We step foot on the far end of this guy Walker's farm up in Ojai and he starts blasting us with buckshot. We know our dead guy was there every night leading up to his death, digging around the periphery of this property."

"No, Shawn wait," Henry said, following Shawn back out to Gus's car as he carried the shovels.

"Oh, Gus will leave his class ring as collateral," Shawn said shutting the trunk of the car.

"No I won't," Gus said.

"Yes you will."

"No, I won't."

"Sure you will."

"No I won't," Gus said, getting into the drivers seat and slamming his door.

"I can't support this," Henry said, crossing his arms and frowning as Aislinn opened the back door.

"Well theres a shocker, you not being supportive," Shawn said, frowning too.

"Would you shut up and listen? I'm saying I can't support you going somewhere where you might get shot," Henry said, sighing.

"What, are you worried about me?" Shawn asked incredulously.

"Shawn, I've been worried about you since you were three years onld and started eating your own toenails," Henry said. Aislinn laughed and slid into the car so she could avoid the rest of the argument. Shawn climbed into the car as Henry stormed back into the house.

"You know, you could be nicer to him. He's just worried," Aislinn said as Gus pulled out of the driveway. Shawn didn't say anything so she sat back in her seat, staring out the window for the hour long drive back to the farm. The cautiously made their way back to the field where the guy had been digging, watching out for the farmer.

"Perfect, this will be easy," Gus said sarcastically as they stared at the fifteen or so holes int he ground.

"Oh theres a pattern here," Shawn said, looking around. "Those guys dig with a reason."

"How do you know that?" Gus asked, frowning.

"Gus, I worked at the museum for almost an entire weekend before I go canned," Shawn said, shaking his head. "Wait a second," he pointed to the dirt piles. "Those weren't tic tac toe boards, those were ally he places he'd dug."

"There were like 25 X's," Gus said, looking around them. "No way he scored that often."

"The X's were misses," Aislinn said, remembering the boards too.

"In this case, O marks the spot," Shawn said, then pointed. "And that's the O."

"This is the only hole filled with a bulldozer," Gus said as they approached it. "No self-respecting paleontologist would use a bulldozer."

"Why do you know that?" Shawn asked, frowning at Gus.

"Because, Shawn, if you use a bull-"

"Gus, I don't actually want to know," Shawn said, interrupting him.

"Then don't ask," Gus said, huffing.

"This shouldn't take long," Shawn said, hefting his shovel and the leaf blower he had strapped over his back. "Grab a shovel. And keep an eye out for that farmer." Aislinn grabbed the shovel from Shawn knowing full well he wasn't going to be doing any work and began digging with Gus. They worked up a sweat quickly even though there was a nice breeze.

"How are you doing on your side?" Gus called to Shawn after a sold fifteen minutes.

"Good, solid," Shawn called back. Aislinn rolle dyer eyes, seeing Shawn leaning back against a dirt pile. "I'm holding up."

"Shawn," Gus huffed, spotting Shawn.

"What? I'm keeping watch, that's how the other guy died. What you aren't worried at all?" Shawn said, then jumped as Gus threw a shovel full of dirt on top of him. "All right, I get it! It's my turn," Shawn said, getting up and accepting the shovel from Gus as he and Aislinn climbed out of the hole.

"This is the end of the loose dirt," Shawn called about five minutes later. Aislinn and Gus jumped down into the hole.

"This is weird," Gus said, frowning at a white lump.

"What, that there's rocks int he ground?" Shawn asked.

"These aren't rocks, Aislinn said, running a hand over one of them. "They're fossils."

"But they've been processed, finished off, residue, rocks chipped away. Stuff you would normally do in a lab."

"So Franzen found something," Shawn said, nodding. "So why wouldn't he just take it out and do the work in the lab where it should be done? Unless…"

"Unless it was too big to move," Gus finished for him. They all looked at each other in excitement.

"Dude, I'm gonna go get the leaf blower," Shawn said, climbing back up then hopping down a moment later. He started up the leaf blower before Aislinn could protest, covering them all with dirt. When the dust settled and they had finished coughing, they stared at the dinosaur head they had just uncovered.

"Holy crap," Aislinn said.

"I just discovered a dinosaur," Gus said, his mouth almost hanging open.

"Come on," Shawn said after another moment of staring. "We need to fill in the hole and get out of here before farmer shootypants comes back." They climbed out of the hole and all began pushing the dirt back into the hole. They drove back to Psych, Gus complaining about them getting dirt in his car the shoe way, then took turns showering in the office bathroom. Luckily, all three of them had changes of clothes there, Aislinn because she had yet to collect the bag she had brought there the first night she slept on the couch, and Shawn because he kept clothes everywhere, and Gus because he always carried a change of clothes in his car, just in case.

"Filling that hole was the worst idea ever," Gus said as the three of them lay on the floor of the office, exhausted.

"It had to be done," Shawn said. "We have to save it for when we unmask Franzen's killer."

"I still don't get it," Gus said.

"He was on the trail of a fossil graveyard that led him right to Deacon Farms," Shawn began explaining. "Farmer wouldn't let him dig on the land, so he takes matters into his own hands after hours."

"But why wouldn't the farmer let him dig?" Aislinn asked, frowning.

"Maybe he didn't want his farm disturbed," Shawn suggested.

"A dig like that is worth millions to the land owner," Gus said, shaking his head. "And the fossils I discovered weren't even on crop land."

"You discovered?" Shawn asked incredulously.

"Don't try to take away my dinosaur discovery Shawn," Gus said. Aislinn cleared her throat. "Our discovery," Gus corrected himself.

"I wouldn't dream of it," Shawn said. "I'm sorry. It was all you. And Aislinn. I'm very proud of you both."

"Don't you think once they unearth that thing there would be a swarm of people crashing in from all over the world?" Gus said.

"Why didn't he just lease the land?" Aislinn asked.

"I don't get it," Gus said, shaking his head.

"I've got an idea," Shawn said, grinning as he sat up.

"What?" Gus asked.

"Let's ask him," Shawn said, grinning.

"What?" Gus asked, louder this time. "We're pretty sure we just found a cold-blooded murderer, and you want to go to his house and ask about it?"

"We can ask nicely," Shawn said, smiling.

"No," Gus said, standing up.

"All right all right," Shawn said in defeat. "We come up with a cover story. We're vacuum salesmen. No, traveling gipsies. No no no! We'll do Of Mice and Men. I'm Lennie."

"No," Gus said again, shaking his head.

"George," Shawn said, adopting a horrible voice. "You said that I could take care of those rabbits, George."

"Shawn," Gus protested.

"And later on you're gonna cook those beets," Shawn continued.

"Shawn," Gus said again.

"Beets make me go-"

"No Lennie," Gus shouted. Aislinn shook her head as they led the Psych office to go back to Gus's car. Gus drove them all out there again, arguing the entire time about Shawn's ideas.

"Gus, you know I've been waiting to pull out my Lennie," Shawn begged. Aislinn snorted again.

"No, Shawn, we do the National Paleontologist Society thing as agreed," Gus said.

"And we keep it very, very simple," Aislinn agreed as they climbed out of the car when Gus parked in front of the fruit stand.

"And why are we stopping here?" Gus asked.

"Have you tried these peaches?" Aislinn asked, walking over to the owned.

"You're back!" The old chinese mad said, obviously excited.

"Yes, sir, we are," Shawn said. "We're addicted to your citrus."

"Peaches aren't citrus," Aislinn said.

"They're stone fruit," Gus added.

"It's the same thing," Shawn said, frowning.

"No, not the same thing," Gus said. "They have pits. {etches, Cherries, Plums, and Apricots."

"I can't do this with you right now," Shawn said, frowning as Aislinn began going through a crate of peaches and picking out the best ones.

"Does your fruit come from Deacon Walker Farms?" Shawn asked the old man.

"Oh, no. We grow on our own little pacel of land," the man said, grinning. "Deacon Walker's farm used to be a supplier of ours years ago, but they don't grow nearly as much as they used to."

"Thank you so much for your information," Shawn said, grinning. "If you have a moment, my friends and I would like to buy every peach on that truck. Including the one you're eating." Aislinn rolled her eyes as Shawn walked back towards the car.

"Sorry for my idiot friend," she said, shaking her head. "We don't want to buy every peach. Just some of them." She gestured to the cardboard box full of the peaches she had picked out, grinning, then fished through her pockets for the cash she had brought exactly for this purpose. She made gus carry the heavy box back to the car, then climbed in beside it. All three of them ate a peach as they drove up to the farmers house.

"You sure you don't want to do Of Mice and Men?" Shawn asked as they got out of the car.

"If you so much as slur one word, I'll give you an Indian burn so hot your socks will catch on fire."

"Indian burn," Shawn said, laughing. "I haven't been threatened with that this millennium."

"Take a shot if your ulna feels safe," Gus said smugly as they climbed the steps to the porch.

"I don't think the ulna's in the forearm," Shawn said as Aislinn took the lead to sand in front of them.

"It is," she said, then knocked on the door.

"How can you Indian burn a bone?" Shawn muttered behind her.

"Stop analyzing my threat," Gus whispered.

"Well get it right," Shawn said.

"I got it right," Gus mumbled as the door swung open.

"Deacon Walker?" Aislinn asked in her best professional voice, even though she was wearing jeans and a blank t-shirt. The man glared at her for a moment, then frowned.

"Sullivan Walker," he replied.

"Oh, well, is Deacon Walker home?" She asked, raising an eyebrow.

"There is no Deacon Walker," he said.

"That's confusing," Gus said behind her.

"I've got nothing," Shawn added.

"Then why name the farm Deacon Walker Farms?" Gus asked, and Aislinn sighed.

"Because it used to be called Deacon Walker Farms," the man said. "Roger Deacon was my partner, he's not anymore."

"Aaaaah," Gus said in understanding.

"That cleans it up nicely," Shawn added. "May we come in?"

"No," the man said. "What do you want?"

"We're from the National Paleontologist Society-" Aislinn began.

"Not interested," the man said, then slammed the door shut.

"Clearly he's not interested," Gus said, turning around to leave. Aislinn moved aside as Shawn stepped forward to knock on the door again.

"We would like to make you a very sizable offer on a very small portion of your-" Shawn began when the man opened the for again, but was cut off as it slammed shut once more. He knocked again and waited for the man to open the door, then pushed his face against the screen. "Hello, my name is Lennie. I like to-" the door slammed shut a third time. "You think he'd open up if I knocked again?" Gus ignored him and Aislinn shrugged, then followed them down the porch steps.

"I'm glad it only took us an hour to get up here," Gus said sarcastically. "Not like I wasted a whole day." He walked around to the drivers side of the car as shawn frowned.

"Franzen dug up here too?" Shawn asked, glancing once at the door, then around the side of the house where a few dirt piles were visible. They walked over to them to get a closer look.

"No he didn't," Gus said, pointing out the tracks int he dirt. "these are all new. And dug with a bulldozer."

"A real paleontologist would never use such an indelicate tool," Shawn said sarcastically. "I got it. So our farmers been digging too."

"Right," Gus said as the headed back to his car.

"But if the gold mines out there, why is he digging over here?" Shawn asked, then frowned as his phone began to ring. "It's my dad. Think he wants his leaf blower back?" He flipped the phone open and listened for a second. Aislinn was just close enough to hear the conversation.

"Shawn? Shawn, you're not anywhere near that farmhouse, are you?" Henry asked.

"Dad, how dare you? Of course not," Shawn replied, grinning at Aislinn who rolled her eyes.

"Good, stay away Shawn. I know why I remember that farm. Deacon Walked Farm. I was up there about twenty years ago. A girl reported that her boyfriend went missing. Roger Deacon. He was a partner in the farm. He was never found, Shawn." Shawn looked up at Gus, then over at Aislinn.

"Never found?" He asked.

"That's right. The farmer claimed he went back to England or some nonsense," Henry said. "The point is, we never found out where he went."

""I think I know where he is," Shawn said, frowning.

"Where?" Henry asked.

"I might be looking at him," Shawn said.

"Shawn!" Henry called over the phone.

"Gotta go," Shawn said, then hung up the phone and looked at Gus. "Dude."

"What?" Gus asked. Shawn grinned an dialed another number on his phone. "Jules. I'm getting a really sting vibe that we all need to go to the Ojai Valley, to Deacon Walker Farms. I guarentee that in ten minutes I can solve the Franzen case, nab the killer, close an additional unsolved murder from twenty years ago, and," he paused for dramatic effect. "And unearth a dinosaur." Gus huffed and Aislinn laughed while Shawn waited not he phone. "Great, see you in an hour." He hung up. "They are on their way. I suggest we wait at the fruit stand." They climbed into the car, all of them glad to get away from the murderer. They spent the next forty five minutes eating peaches and lounging around the fruit stand, then when the others finally arrived, Shawn convinced them to get the farmer to lead them out to the field where they would be waiting.

"This is as far as my property goes," Walker said, pointing to the fence line as the small group made their way across the field toward the filled in holes. "That's all there is. Well, I've answered all your questions detective," he said. "What more do you want from me?"

"I'm not entirely sure, sir," Lassiter said, shrugging.

"We just have one more person we need you to talk to," Juliet said. Shawn took that as their cue to step out of the copse of trees they had been hiding in and walk over to them.

"Lennie?" The farmer asked as he spotted Shawn. Aislinn chuckled.

"Lennie?" Juliet whispered to Aislinn as she came to stand beside them.

"Don't even ask," Aislinn said.

"My name is not Lennie, Mr. Walker," Shawn said. "But if it were, I would have been amazing."

"No you wouldn't have," Gus said.

"Would have brought tears, Gus," Shawn said.

"Guy's," Juliet interrupted. "The point?"

"The truth is I'm a psychic," Shawn said, lifting a hand to his temple. "I work for the SBPD and the mystic vibrations of the sea have brought me here to solve not one, but two murders."

"Your a what?" The farmer asked, and Aislinn chuckled again.

"Christopher Franzen was a persistent annoyance, huh? He couldn't help it, he department was going under. He was desperate to find something significant to save his career, and he knew that your property held the key," he said, flailing his arms about. Aislinn sighed, half wishing he would just get to the point already. She heard Lassiter sigh too and smiled. "But you wouldn't let him dig," Shawn continued, and Juliet and Lassiter, seeing where this was going, moved to stand behind the farmer in case he tried to run. "You couldn't let him dig. So he did what any self respecting paleontologist would do. He dug anyway, secretly, under the blanket of night and into the early morning. And he dug, and her dug, and he found something. And that's when you found him. You knew the magnitude of the find. Once word got out you'd never be able to keep the rest of the world from digging here too. And you couldn't have the rest of the world digging here either, could you?"

"Shawn!" A voice called, and they all turned to see Henry jogging across the field.

"Dad?" Shawn asked, frowning. "What are you doing here?"

"I was worried,: Henry said, panting as he came to a stop beside them. "About my tools." They all looked at him. "What? If I had known you were finally smart enough to being backup I wouldn't have had to come up here, Shawn."

"Shawn, will you tell them why Walker wouldn't let him dig?" Gus asked, trying to get them back on track.

"Roger Deacon," Shawn began.

"Deacon is buried on the property!" Henry said, fingering it out.

"Dad!" Shawn protested. "Dad, you ruined the big reveal."

"You already mentioned his name, Shawn," Henry said, rolling his eyes.

"They don't know that Deacon was the parter Walker killed twenty years ago," Shawn continued, his voice still protesting.

"Hey now, wait a minute here-" the farmer began.

"He what now?" Lassiter asked, finally interested.

"Yeah, he killed Deacon and buried him somewhere on the farm," Shawn said, his voice sullen now. "And he can't remember where. Isn't that right, Farmer Shooty Pants?"

"I don't have to stand here and take this," Walked said angrily.

"No, actually, you kinda do," Lassiter said. "What doest his have to do with Christopher Franzen?"

"He kileld Franzen when he caught him standing over his dinosaur skull discovery, sending him flying right into the teeth of the dinosaur," Shawn explained. "But he couldn't bury him here. No, no, no, he had called the farm, he had snooped around the farm. There was a trail to the farm. No, he had to dump him somewhere where there'd be no forensics. Like the ocean. Just let the salt water clean the corpse and wash it ashore. And the murder scene? Well, he just hopped on his handy bulldozer and filled the hole."

"I'm getting a bad feeling about your streak," Juliet said to Lassiter.

"You too huh?" He asked, frowning.

"I think i need a lawyer," Walker said.

"I think you're right," Lassiter said. "Put your hands behind your back."

"What?" Walker asked in protest.

"You heard me," Lassiter said.

"You still haven't answered the question why he dug all the holes around the house, Shawn," Henry said.

"Dad, thats the finale," Shawn said with a groan. "That's why I don't invite you to these things." Shawn turned back to the others. "He was looking for Deacon's body," he muttered. "Whatever."

"Are we done here Mr. Spencer?" The chief asked.

"No we are not dun here," Shawn said, growing excited again. "For my final demonstration I will now discover a dinosaur."

"Shawn!" Gus protested.

"Actually, Gus will now discover a dinosaur," Shawn said, handing Gus the shovel. Gus grinned, then frowned.

"Wait a second. You just want me to dig this hole," Gus said, glaring.

"I do not," Shawn said.

"I'm not falling for that, Shawny boy," Gus said, throwing the shovel back at Shawn. "You dig it."

"I'll take credit for the discovery," Shawn said, picking up the shovel as the detectives turned back towards the house, Walker in handcuffs. Aislinn briefly considered staying, but decided against it as Shawn and Gus began shouting at each other.

I can't believe I've drive out here three times this week," Gus complained as they drove back to the city. "I've put so many miles on this car.:

"You know, we could have taken my car," Aislinn said from the back seat, trying to talk around another mouthful of peach. "I actually own my car. And it doesn't look like a giant blueberry." They were silent for a moment.

"We are taking your car next time," Gus said as Shawn switched not he radio. Aislinn grinned, recognizing the song at the same time the boys did, which was just in time to belt out the lyrics to the chorus, very off key, with them.

* * *

The next morning Aislinn was at the Psych office, sitting at her newly installed desk, putting little nick backs from her old house onto it when Shawn came in.

"Hey, want to come with me to my dads to return his shovels?" Shawn asked.

"Sure," Aislinn said, standing. She helped him carry the tools to her car, then drove to the beach front.

"Oh come on guys," Shawn said as they walked into the kitchen. Aislinn frowned, seeing the psychologist and Gus there too. "We;re still doing this intervention thing?"

"Yes, yes Shawn, we are," Henry said, pacing across the room to take a seat in one of the dining chairs. "Son, you have no sense of responsibility. And lately you've been purposely putting yourself in a severe amount of unnecessary danger. On top of which you are constantly belittling the good work of-"

"Actually Henry, I may have stretched the truth a bit," the psychologist said, stepping forward. Shawn grinned. "This isn't about Shawn, it's about you.

"What?" Henry asked, confused.

"Can we talk about your obsessive need for control?" The psychologist asked.

"You come into my house," Henry began, standing up angrily. "You lie to me?"

"Lets try to be rational," the psychologist said as Gus and Aislinn began inching toward the door. "Did you really drive all the way up to Ojai just to crash Shawn's crowning moment?"

"Get out," Henry said, standing. Aslinn opened the door, letting Gus push past her.

"Henry, we're here for you. At least listen," the psychologist said, now scooting closer to the door as Shawn followed.

"Out, now," Henry said, pointing to the door. "Get out."

"I'd like to start," Shawn said as they were practically pushed out of the house. "When I was about seven, he-" Shawn was cut off as the door slammed behind them. "You up for some peaches?" He asked the others as the psychologist shook his head and walked away.

"Sure," Aislinn said. "We can have them at my apartment and you guys can finally help me put the furniture together." They both groaned but followed her to her car anyway.


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter Five

The day after the arrest of the farmer, Shawn insisted that she come with him to the station to collect the check saying that since it was the first case she had actually been hired on for, she definitely had to be there. Gus approved the idea only because he thought it better for Aislinn to hold onto the check than Shawn.

"Here," Gus said, handing Aislinn a piece of paper. "That's a deposit slip. Just take the check straight to the bank before Shawn has a chance to use it for something else."

"Okay," Aislinn said, smiling. Gus seemed prone to overreacting. Usually when Shawn wasted money it was because they had been paid in cash for something. Or because he had gotten ahold of one of Gus's credit cards. Aislinn kept hers well hidden while she was at the office to avoid that happening to her.

Shawn was giddy as they drove to the station, probably anxious to see Juliet, but Aislinn wasn't going to ask about it. Sure enough, as soon as they pulled up to the station, Shawn ditched her to go find Juliet. Aislinn sighed and went to the front desk alone to pick up the check, then after signing for it, she went in search of Shawn, but couldn't find him anywhere. She chose a bench near the chiefs office to wait, figuring that eventually Juliet would come back to her desk, and Shawn probably wouldn't be that far behind her. She pulled out her phone for something to do, shedding her gloves at the same time so she could actually use the touch screen.

"You!" She heard someone call and looked up to see Lassiter pointing at her as he stood with the chief next to his desk. She tilted her head in question, then shoot as he waved her over. "You claim to be psychic right?" He asked. The chief glared at him for a moment but didn't comment. Aislinn nodded slowly, not sure what he was getting at. "How exactly does that work? You said it was different from Spencer's… gift." He said the word as though it were a swear and she looked down at the floor to reply, wanting to avoid the glare that usually came with that tone of voice.

"It is different," she said quietly. "I have to touch something in order to get any… vision from it."

"So if you shook hands with Walker you could tell us where he buried the body?" Lassiter asked eagerly, the change in tone making Aislinn look up. She frowned.

"I could…" she trailed off, hesitating.

"But?" The chief asked, raising an eyebrow.

"It would be… unpleasant," Aislinn muttered looking back down at her feet.

"Unpleasant how?" The chief asked, but Lassiter interrupted her reply.

"Well he won't confess and we need to know where the body is to get his murder charges to stick since there was no forensic evidence linking him to the second murder. If we could find where he buried the first one we could get him put away for life," he said looking toward the hallway that led to the interrogation chambers. Aislinn gulped. "Or are you just another fake, like Spencer?"

"He's not… I'm… okay," Aislinn said, her heart sinking. She really didn't want to see anything from the farmer's memories, especially not a murder or him burying the body. At least during the case of the missing books that had turned into murder she had managed to avoid anything too graphic. Lassiter grinned smugly, obviously thinking she was just going to make up some excuse as to why she couldn't see where the body was. He wanted her to fail at this so he could accuse her of being a fake, which meant that she would have to point them to where the body was or risk Shawn being outed as a fake too.

She followed him down the stairs to the interrogation room where the man sat, waiting for someone to come in and ask him questions. The chief and Lassiter went into the viewing room leaving Aislinn alone in the hallway. She gulped, then pulled open the door, ignoring the flashes of image she got from the doorknob. The man looked up as she entered and raised an eyebrow, obviously wondering why a girl that looked like a skinny teenager was there for.

"Hi," she said, walking over to the table. His hands were handcuffed together, but he could still raise them so she held out hers as though to shake his hand. "I'm Aislinn, we met yesterday." He lifted his hands automatically, gripping hers to shake without even thinking. She let the images flow through her mind and her face grew ashen as she watched them. Knowing the chief and Lassiter were listening, she dropped his hand and swallowed, trying to calm her suddenly revolting stomach. She backed toward the door a few steps then drew in a breath and closed her eyes. "He was stabbed. 16 paces due north from the back door, then 7 paces to the east, underneath a pine tree. The knife is with the body." The man in front of her frowned for a moment, then his eyes widened in horror and he lunged to his feet. Aislinn was out the door before the others could exit the viewing room. She ran across the narrow hallway to a bathroom and barely made it to the toilet before throwing up everything she had eaten for breakfast and lunch that day. She wiped away the few tears that had leaked from her eyes, then peeked out the door to check if the hallway was clear. She made it up the stairs and down part of the hall before having to dodge into an empty conference room to avoid someone. She slid down the wall and brought her knees to her face, trying to calm her breathing. She closed her eyes, then opened them immediately as the face of the dead man shone behind her eyelids. Even with her eyes open she could see his face, gasping for breath and the light fading out of his eyes until they were still and his face drained of color. She gasped and buried her face into her arms, drawing in another rattling breath. She could vaguely hear shouting from somewhere nearby, then footsteps passing the doors at a quick pace. She focused on slowing her breathing and tried to ignore the face of the man dying in front of her over and over.

Her concentration was broken a few minutes later by the piping of someones knees as they knelt in front of her. She wiped her face on her shirt sleeves before she looked up, then used her hands to wipe away more tears as they fell. She had expected Shawn, and was surprised to see Lassiter in front of her instead.

"Sorry," she said, frantically wiping her eyes now in an effort to stop crying. she drew her knees closer to her, trying to make herself as small as possible. "I'm not crying because-" She stopped as he moved to sit cross legged in front of her which she assumed must be uncomfortable to do in the suit he was wearing.

"Spencer has… informed me that you physically see a persons memories when you touch them and that it was unfair of me to have asked you to do that," Lassiter began.

"It's-" she began but was cut off as he held a hand out in front of him.

"I have to agree with him this time," he said, then frowned. "Don't tell him I said that." Aislinnn smiled slightly. "Anyway, I wanted to apologize for asking you to do something that causes you this much distress."

"It's fine," she said, then sighed and wrapped her arms back around her legs and rested her chin on top of them. "It was just… a shock I guess." She was mildly surprised that Lassiter had bothered trying to comfort her at all, it really didn't fit into the image of him she had. He nodded in understanding.

"I threw up the first time I saw a dead body," he admitted. Her eyes widened in shock and she stared at him for a moment. He smiled a little. "I'm not lying." She gave him another thin smile.

"It's not the dead body part that bothers me," she said, looking at the floor. "It's just that… when I see the memories, I see it from that persons point of view, with their emotions and the smells and the sounds." She shuddered as the memory replayed in front of her eyes again. "I can feel the knife…" she opened her palm, then clenched it into a fist. Her face grew white again and she frowned, trying to get the image out of her mind.

"Stop thinking about it," he suggester, tilting his head to one side. She almost laughed aloud at the similarity between that movement and the one Shawn made when he suggested something he knew was useless. She wondered if Shawn had gotten the action from Lassiter, but figured it was the other way around since Shawn suggested useless things much more often.

"It doesn't work like that," she said, shaking her head. "Once I see the memories they are up here forever," she said, tapping the side of her head. She sighed, then moved so her legs were also crossed. "I'm fine though, really. Thanks for…" she trailed off, not really sure what she was thanking him for. For being nice? For making sure she wasn't going to go jump off a bridge? "Talking," she settled on, then grinned, feeling a bit better. "And don't worry, I won't tell Shawn that you are capable of being nice. He thinks you are a robot with no emotions other than anger and annoyance." Lassiter snorted and rolled his eyes, getting to his feet. He held a hand out to help her up but she stood by herself. Her raised a brow at her in question. "It feels like cheating to get to know someone with a touch rather than talking to them," she explained, assuming he had probably forgotten that if she touched his hand she would see his memories.

"Oh," he said, pulling his hand back. She wiped underneath her eyes once more to make sure there weren't any tears left there, then turned toward the door. "Well if you every need someone to talk to…" he said, then trailed off, obviously regretting saying that.

"Don't worry, I won't come to you," she said, grinning again. "Emotions make you uncomfortable."

"Did you get that from a vision?" He asked, scowling at her. She laughed and shook her head.

"No. From casual observation," she said as he pulled the door of the conference room open and stood back to let her out first. He grumbled something too low for her to hear as she passed.

She had barely set foot in the hallway when a heavy body crashed into her. She would have fallen too if Shawn hadn't purposely overbalanced for her weight when he hit her.

"Aislinn!" He yelled in her ear and she laughed, pushing him away. "I'm so sorry that Liassie was such a meanie and I wasn't here to protect you!"

"Shut up Spencer," Lassiter said from behind him, rolling his eyes. Shawn turned around and shoved Aislinn behind him, glaring at the detective.

"I don't need protecting Shawn," she said, smiling. "I'm older than you, remember?"

"You're shorter so that doesn't count," Shawn said over his shoulder.

"You're an idiot," she said, then grabbed his arm to drag him away from the glaring contest he was having with Lassiter. Aislinn smiled back at the detective as she led Shawn outside and back to her car. He talked at her the whole way to the back, then the whole way back to the Psych office, but she ignored most of it.

* * *

"Are you up for going to the station today?" Shawn asked Aislinn as they took turns tossing crumpled balls of paper into the basketball hoop above the trash can. It had been almost two weeks since she had been back to the station, not that that was her choice. Shawn was being extra careful, as though she would break or burst into tears if he said the wrong thing. She rolled her eyes, then tossed her paper, smiling as it sailed into the trash perfectly.

"Of course," she said, kicking her feet off her desk where they had been resting and turning in her chair to face him. "Do we have a case?"

"Yep," Shawn said, grinning as his throw went right through the hoop. "The chief called this morning. We have a meeting in her office at one."

"Shawn, its 12:45," Aislinn said, getting to her feet.

"So?" Shawn said, still sitting with his feet up on his desk. She walked over and pushed them off.

"So it takes at least fifteen minutes to get there," she said, grabbing her purse and keys. "Lets go."

"We have to wait for Gus though," Shawn said, protesting as she pulled him through the door and locked it behind them.

"Gus is probably already there," she said, rolling her eyes and shoving him in the direction of her car.

Traffic was light so they made the drive in just over ten minutes, reaching the station door just as Gus did. Aislinn led the way inside and to the chiefs office, only belatedly realizing that Shawn and Gus had gotten lost somewhere on the way. She sighed but entered the office anyway, finding a place near the wall to stand. Lassiter and Juliet were already there conversing with the chief, and they payed her no mind, though the both glanced at her as she entered. Gus arrived a moment later, following a man in a dark suit. The chief glanced at Gus, who shrugged, then sighed and started the meeting.

"Detectives, this is special agent Ewing. He's here to investigate a series of false $100 bills recently spotted in the area. So let me officially welcome you to Santa Barbara. We are all ready and willing to-" she was cut off as Shawn opened the door and walked over to Gus.

"Don't let me interrupt," he said, ignoring the glares aimed in his direction. "Please, continue." The chief sighed and Aislinn rolled her eyes at him.

"Anyway," the chief said, visibly annoyed. "Mr. Spencer, this is special agent Ewing from the Treasury department in Washington."

"Yes," Shawn said, nodding seriously. "We sniffed one another in the hallway." Aislinn almost groaned, knowing that whatever Shawn had done was probably embarrassing.

"He is here because they have been tracking an aggressive forger who's been counterfeiting large numbers of $100 bills and the laundering the money into small communities across the country," the chief continued.

"The last being a Home Depot right here in the heart of your little Hamlet," Ewing said.

"Well we are just raring to help you with this federal bust," Lassiter said excitedly. Aislinn covered her mouth to keep from laughing as Shawn as Gus looked at each other in amusement. Ewing stared at him a moment, then turned back to the chief.

"Who is this?" He asked, pointing to Lassiter, who scowled.

"This is Carlton Lassiter, our head detective, and his junior partner, Juliet O'Hara," the chief said, gesturing to them in turn.

"Ah, the name Juliet," Ewing said softly, lifting Juliet's hand in his own. "'How silver-sweet sound lovers' tongues by night,'" he quoted. Aislinn raised both her brows in surprise. "Shakespeare. Romeo and Juliet."

"Tootie, you in trouble?" Shawn said in a weird accent, very over dramatically. Aislinn snorted in laughter, then turned red as Lassiter and Juliet turned to look at her. "It's Mindy Cohn, Facts of Life," Shawn said when they turned to look at him. The chief sighed again but this time Aislinn thought she saw the corners of her mouth twitch up.

"Could you all please state your names again? And please speak clearly," Ewing said, pulling a small device from his coat pocket and holding it up. Aislinn rolled her eyes as Lassiter got per excited about the device again only to be told it was actually connected to a person, then get denied the use of a stenographer by the chief.

"Now what I need from all of you is your full cooperation in assisting special agent Ewing in any way he sees fit," the chief said, drawing Aislinn's wandering mind back to the present. "Now, any questions?" Darn, she must have missed most of the briefing. Now she would be forced to go off of whatever Shawn and Gus had heard, which she hoped was enough.

"I have a question for Special," Shawn said, raising his hand.

"Who is this?" Eweing asked, pointing at Shawn and Gus.

"This is Shawn Spencer," the chief said, gesturing to him. "And his partners, Burton Guster and Aislinn Kelly. Mr. Spencer is a psychic with the department who I thought might be helpful."

"Well, next time I have to go on a panty raid I'll give him a call," Ewing said, rolling his eyes. "But we already have our own psychic. She's just started in the department and she is already a superstar. Got us so close to the counterfeiter a month ago in Wilmette, Illinois. We must have missed him by only a few minutes." He gestured to the door as it opened and a woman with dark hair walked in. She stood next to Shawn and smirked at him as he frowned.

"Mr. Spencer, Lindsay-" Ewing said.

"Leikin. We too met in the hallway," Shawn said, still frowning.

"Okay, let's adjourn this meeting," the chief said. "I know agent Ewing has prepared informational packets for all of you. We will meet at the Home Depot tomorrow.

"Let's say 0700 hours," Ewing said, looking at his watch.

"700 hours is almost twenty days," Shawn said, laughing. "Shouldn't we act sooner?"

"0700 is 7a.m. Shawn," Juliet said.

"Precisely detective," Ewing said, smirking at her. "Striking and whip-smart. Intriguing."

"I knew that too," Lassiter said, but Ewing ignored him. "You have Pennsylvania Ave. running through your veins. Ever consider taking the Bureau exam?" Juliet shrugged, then turned to leave the room.

"I have," Lassiter said, following them.

"Let me set up that conference area for you. Right this way," the chief interrupted, leading Ewing and Lindsay from the room.

"Little skeptical of psychic's are we?" Aislinn heard Shawn ask as he followed the woman from the office.

"I should have said just you," she replied. "And don't think I didn't pick up on that calluses on my hands guitar clue. Good one. This is gonna be good. I'm gonna solve this case, and I'm gonna prove you're a fake. Fun right?" She turned and walked away from Shawn, who frowned after her. When they were left alone, Aislinn glanced at him.

"I can…" she twiddled her fingers to illustrate using her gift. "If you want."

"Nah," Shawn said, shrugging. "It'll be fine. Lets go back to the office."

"I'm going back to work," Gus said, looking at his watch. He handed two of the informational packets Ewing had given him to Aislinn, then turned and left.

"Come on," Aislinn said, sighing. "We can stop and get smoothies on the way back."

"Yes!" Shawn said, grinning as he followed her back to her car. They rode back to the office and, finally, after an hour long stop at the smoothie place, arrived back at the office.

"Don't you think we should do a little investigating?" Aislinn asked as Shawn sat at his desk.

"Nah," Shawn said, picking up a magazine and flipping through the pages. "We can do that tomorrow. Or in 700 hours."

"Aren't you worried about what that woman said?" Aislinn asked, frowning.

"Negative," Shawn said, grinning. "There's no way she's as good as me. Plus we have a real psychic."

"I don't-" Aislinn began but Shawn cut her off.

"I know," he said holding his hands up. "You don't want to be in the center of things."

"Did I tell you that?" Aislinn asked, frowning. She had been meaning to talk to him about it for a while now, ever since seeing the murder in the farmers memories, but she hadn't wanted Shawn to think she was weak.

"Nope," he said, leaning back in his chair and kicking his feet onto his desk. "But I do notice things. Sometimes."

"I just don't like being the Center of attention," she said, looking down. "Also I don't want to see any more murders."

"It's fine," Shawn said, smiling. She smiled back a little, still feeling like she was letting everyone down by not doing more.

The office fell into a silence for almost half an hour until Shawn finally decided to head out. Aislinn stood too, figuring that since they had to be up early the next morning she would go home too. It was only a little after seven and she wasn't really tired at all, so she decided to stop at the pub near her apartment. She wasn't going to drink anything, but the place served really good nachos and she really didn't feel like cooking. She changed her mind about the drink when the waitress told her it would be a twenty minute wait for the food. Aislinn found a barstool to wait and ordered a beer, then sipped on it as she leaned her back against the bar and watched the few people there. It was still a little early, and it was a Wednesday, so the place shouldn't have been as busy as it was. Maybe it was a holiday r something that Aislinn had just forgotten about. Why else would there be so many people out? She turned back to face the bar as she finished off her beer so she could order another one, then jumped as a hand came to rest on her shoulder.

"Hey baby," the man said, slurring his words a little. She glanced at her watch briefly, wondering why he was so drunk when it wasn't even eight, then shrugged his hand off of her. "Oh don't be like that," he said, draping his arm around her shoulders and squeezing a little. She jumped down from her stool and slid under his arm, moving too quickly for him to notice what she was doing. She started to walk away, hoping he would take the hint. No such luck. "Hey!" He said loudly, grabbing her arm to pull her back towards him.

"I'm not interested," she said softly, ducking her head. She could smell the alcohol coming from him and tried to pull away again. "Please," she said, her voice growing a little panicked. "Leave me alone."

"Let's go somewhere a little less crowded baby," he said, grinning stupidly at her. He began to pull her toward the back of the bar where the bathrooms were. She pulled against him the entire time but he didn't drop her arm, instead he wrapped his free hand around her waist to pull her along better. She looked around for someone to help her but no one was really paying attention.

"Stop," she begged as they reached the hallway to the bathrooms. Her heart sank as she noticed it was empty and very dimly lit. He stopped walking and turned to press her against the wall. She used the momentary freedom of her arms to scratch him and he jumped back a little, swearing as he pulled her hands away from his face. There were three long stripes of red across his cheeks that were beginning to bleed a little, but he didn't pay attention to them anymore.

"You little bitch," he said, pushing his entire body against hers, pinning her to the wall. "Playing hard to get, huh? Let's go out back."

"No!" Aislinn said, trying to knee him in his junk as he turned towards the back door, both her arms clenched in his hands. The man stumbled as he turned, then fell back a step and let go of her arms, making her fall to the floor. A second later, the guy fell beside her, unconscious. She scooted a fay from him, then yelped as someone else lifted her to her feet. She struggled against them until the let her go and she backed up to the wall.

"Aislinn?" The newcomer asked. She looked up and had to wipe her eyes to see. She hadn't realized she was crying. It took her a moment to recognize the person, but when she did she let out a sigh of relief.

"Lassiter," she said, not really knowing what to do. The man on the floor groaned as he began to wake up and now Aislinn could see the shadow of a bruise forming over one of his cheeks.

The next thing she knew Lassiter had grabbed her arm and led her back through the bar and out the front door.

"If you are going to go out to bars at least be smart enough to carry pepper spray or something," Lassiter said as he practically dragged her along. She nodded, keeping her head down and just following after him silently. She wasn't hungry anymore anyway, so there was really no point in waiting for her food to be done, even though she had already payed for it. "And seriously, why would you go out drinking alone? You can't defend yourself sat all." She wasn't even sure if he realized they were outside now as he berated her. Her tears started spilling over again and she raised her free arm to wipe them away as they finally came to a stop right outside her apartment building.

"I'm sorry," she said, letting her hair fall in front of her face to hide it as she looked down at her feet.

"You really should take a self defense class or something," he said, dropping her arm. She nodded again but didn't say anything. "Are you okay?" He asked, his voice a little softer. She looked up, nodding.

"Thank you," she said. "For, uh, punching that guy."

"Don't tell anyone. Cops aren't supposed to do that," Lassiter said, putting his hands in his pockets and looking around them. "I can go back and arrest him though. Do you want to press charges?" Aislinn smiled and shook her head.

"I wasn't going out for a drink or anything," she said, feeling the need to explain herself for some reason. "I was just hungry and on my way home and I didn't want to cook anything. I don't usually go to bars by myself, I know it's stupid. But I figured since it was so close to my house and…" She gestured at the building, then frowned. "How do you know where I live?"

"Oh, uh," he rubbed the back of his neck, looking more like a boy than a detective. She grinned.

"Did you look me up on the police database?" She asked, trying not to laugh at his awkwardness.

"I was just making sure you weren't a criminal or anything," he said, then frowned and stood up straighter.

"I didn't know I even had a file or anything," she said, tiling her head to one side as she tried to think back as to what her police file could possible say.

"You were put into the system sixteen years ago for getting a speeding ticket," Lassiter said.

"Oh yeah. I remember that. I only had my license for a week before getting that ticket and then my mom wouldn't let me drive again until I turned eighteen," she said, laughing a little, then frowning. "I thought speeding tickets went away after five years."

"In some states," he said, shrugging. "But it always stays on your police record, it just gets taken off the public records."

"Oh," she said, looking down again. They stood in a slightly awkward silence for a few moments, looking around the street.

"Did you want to-" Aislinn asked, pointing at the door. She stopped, realizing he had started talking at the same time.

"Well I should-" he had half turned away, then turned back as she spoke. "What?"

"I was going to ask if you wanted to come up," she said, gesturing toward the building again. "I still haven't had dinner, and I'm assuming you haven't either since you are stills dressed for work."

"These are my casual clothes," he said, frowning as he looked down at his suit. She raised an eyebrow, half smiling.

"They look exactly the same as your work clothes," she said.

"No, I'm wearing different shoes," he said, almost pouting now. She laughed.

"Come on," she said, turning to walk to the front door. "I'll make you some food." He followed after her, grumbling about the difference between dress shoes and loafers.

"Hm," Lassiter said when they had reached her apartment. He stood near the door and looked around the wide living space.

"What?" She asked, her hands on her hips and one eyebrow raised.

"It's cleaner than I would have expected for someone who works with Spencer," he said, shrugging.

"Wait," she said as he made to step forward. "No shoes on the carpet." She tried not to laugh as he toed off his shoes, then wen tint the adjoining kitchen/dining room and opening a few cupboards to see what she could make. Lassiter followed after her and took a seat at the table. "Obviously you've never seen Gus's apartment either. It's not quite as clean as mine because I obsessively organize things when I'm bored, but it's much cleaner than Shawn's current place." As she spoke she pulled out a box from the cupboard, looked at it, then put it back and kept looking. "It's like spending time with Shawn makes us have to be neat to counteract him." Lassiter snorted but didn't say anything. "And actually both of them are sort of disgusting at the office. They never clean anything. If I didn't pick up the trash and wash the dishes it would be terrible. I don't know how they managed before I got here." She took out another box, frowned, and put it back, then turned to face him. "It would appear as though I have no food here. Well, there's ramen noodles, a tomato, and like six baby carrots in the fridge." Lassiter raised an eyebrow in amusement. "Also there's a box of instant potatoes that might have been here when I moved in." He chuckled that time and she smiled, glad she was sort of getting him to express an emotion other than anger. She filled up a kettle with water and put it on the stove to boil, then fished through her cupboards for tea. "Tea?" she asked, holding up the teabag packets. He shrugged so she got a glass down for him, then took the ramen packets out of the cupboard and put them together, then into the microwave. Five minutes later they were both sitting at the table with bowls of ramen and cups of tea.

"Thanks," Lassiter said, though he sounded unsure as he looked into the bowl.

"Sorry it's not five star restaurant quality. I blame the microwave. It doesn't work very well," she said, keeping her face straight. He snorted and she grinned. She moved the noodles around her bowl with her fork for a few minutes, her appetite gone as she thought about the afternoon again.

"Hey," Lassiter said, pulling her out of her thoughts. "It's normal to go into shock after a traumatic experience." She raised one eyebrow, her mouth tipping up at the corners.

"I'm not going into shock," she said, picking up both their bowls as she stood. She dumped hers down the garbage disposal then rinsed out both empty bowls and put them into the dishwasher. She noticed her hands were shaking a little as she closed the dishwasher and she took in a deep breath to calm herself. "You're right though. I should learn self defense." She sat back in her chair at the table and sipped her tea slowly even though it was now room temperature. "It would be useful to know."

"I can teach you," Lassiter said, then opened his mouth as she looked at him in surprise. "I mean, if you want… I know how… never mind." She almost laughed at how awkward he was. Maybe that's how it was supposed to be like with all new people and she had just passed by that with Shawn and Gus because of the memory thing.

"I don't think the 'pulling out a gun' defense will work for me," she said, smiling.

"I know the kinds of self defense things they teach in classes too," Lassiter said, rolling his eyes. She looked at him curiously for a moment. "I have a little sister. I taught her how to fend off guys and stuff." Aislinn laughed at his wording then considered him for a moment.

"You're actually a nice person aren't you?" She said, grinning at his obvious discomfort. "You're just really awkward about being nice. I totally get it now." He frowned. "I meant that in a not bad way." He raised an eyebrow and she frowned. "I just meant that it's nice of you to offer to teach me self defense." He snorted and she hit his arm. "Shut up." They sat in silence for another moment, this time it was a comfortable one.

"You know, I don't understand why you and Shawn don't get along better," she said when the silence began to grow a little awkward.

"Because he is an annoying twit," Lassiter said. "And I'm going to prove that he's a fake." Aislinn frowned a little, wondering if maybe he was being nice to her because he wanted her to tell him whether or not Shawn was actually psychic.

"I'm not telling secrets that aren't mine to tell," she said, crossing her arms. He looked up, a surprised expression on his face.

"I wasn't going to ask," he said, and she relaxed again.

"Sorry," she mumbled. "It's just that usually when people… know you can do something they can't they expect you to use it to benefit them."

"Ah," he said, nodding in understanding. "That's why I don't have friends. Also I dislike most people."

"You can't honestly tell me you have no friends," Aislinn said incredulously. He shrugged. "What about Juliet? Or like… people you went to school with or something?"

"Work partners can't be friends," he said, shrugging. "And most of the people I went to school with were idiots." She shook her head.

"Work partners can be friends. And I'm pretty sure Juliet considers you to be her friend. I'd also add Shawn and Gus to your list of friends," she held up a hand as he started to protest. "Just because they are annoying doesn't mean they aren't your friends. So theres at least four people you can consider friends."

"Four people?" He asked, frowning.

"Well I'm on that list too obviously," she said, grinning. "I'd say the chief is also on that list… maybe. I don't know if she counts though."

"She doesn't," he said, shaking his head and frowning. "And neither do Spencer or Guster."

"You are stubborn," she said, half smiling. "And there has to be at least one person you were friends with in high school that you still talk to occasionally. Or from college."

"Nope," he said, shaking his head. "I hated all of them."

"There's not even one?" She pried, trying to get him to admit to having friends.

"None. Do you still talk to people from high school?" He asked, trying to call her bluff.

"Well thats different," she said, scowling. "I didn't talk to anyone in high school to begin with so obviously I don't talk to them now either."

"No one?" He asked, frowning. "Why not?"

"My mother thought it wasn't a good idea for me to have friends with my… weird psychic thing. She thought that if I made friends they would find out and it would get around town, which she wanted to avoid. She was probably right. Up until like a week ago I had absolutely no control over it at all," she said, rambling a little. She was exhausted from the day, though she hadn't done much.

"And now you can control it?" He asked, raising a brow.

"Well a little. I know how to stop seeing things every time I touch something. Sort of. I haven't quite gotten the hang of it yet, hence the gloves," she said, holding up her hands and letting the sleeves of her shirt fall over her wrists to show the edges of the gloves.

"You wear gloves?" He asked, leaning forward curiously.

"Yeah, most of the time. That way I don't accidentally touch things. Or people," she said, pulling her sleeves back over the gloves. "I thought you didn't believe in psychics." She asked, not sure why he was so curious about her all of a sudden.

"I don't believe Spencer is one," he said, shrugging and leaning back in his chair. "How exactly does that all work?" He asked, waving a hand to gesture to her. She chuckled.

"When I touch something I get flashes of all the memories attached to it," she said, trying to simplify it since she herself didn't really know exactly how it all worked. "If I let it, the memories just kind of store themselves in my mind. It only takes a few seconds to see them all because I don't really _see _them. I just sort of know and can recall them later." She shrugged, knowing she wasn't doing a good job of explaining it. "And I don't forget them. Ever. I can still recall things from visions I got when I was a child in perfect detail."

"Fascinating," he said, and she couldn't tell if he was being sarcastic or not. "So you can know someone's entire history by shaking their hand?"

"No, I only get the important things at first. The memories of things that changed them into who they are at that moment," she said.

"At first?" He asked.

"Yeah, like, a handshake. I can get the less important memories if I maintain the contact longer. Like with Shawn. He's helping me figure out how to control it all so I have a lot of his memories in here," she tapped the side of her head. "And I can do the opposite too. Like, put my memories into other people's heads. And Shawn and I worked out how to communicate without talking, like telepathy. I'd never tried that until a few weeks ago." She looked up at him then, realizing she had probably said too much about Shawn's involvement in all of it. She went over her words in her head and let out a sigh of relief when she realized that nothing she had said could be taken to mean that Shawn was a fake. Lassiter was tapping his fingers on the edge of the table as he thought about what she had said. Finally he shook his head and leaned forward, resting his elbows on the table. "Um, can you not tell everyone about what I just said, please? I don't like getting weird looks from people."

"Sure," he said, shrugging, still in thought.

"What's wrong?" She asked after another moment.

"I really don't want to believe that psychics are real," he said, shaking his head. She frowned.

"You don't have to believe it," she said. "And I don't really like the term psychic anyway." He raised a brow at her. "Psychic implies magic or whatever, and I don't believe in magic," she explained.

"Well, is there another explanation?" He asked, frowning. She shrugged.

"Magic makes it sound like I'm delusional," she said.

"I haven't ruled that out yet," he said, but his voice was joking. She smiled.

"My dad died when I was really little, I don't remember him at all, he had a brain tumor," she said, launching into her own theory of why she could see memories of other people. "They say the average human only uses about 10% of their brains right? Well, before my dad died they did a bunch of tests, like CT scans and PET scans. My mom had copies of all of them somewhere. Anyway, the doctor's notes said that there was a part of his brain in use that most people didn't use. I think that my being able to see memories and hear thoughts and stuff is because part of my brain that shouldn't be functioning, is functioning." Lassiter nodded as he thought.

"That makes more sense than magic," he said. "Have you gotten a CT scan to see if you're right?"

"No," she said, frowning. "I didn't know about my dad's brain scans until after my mom died and I was going through her things and since then I've been busy with moving here and stuff. My mom wanted to keep everything unusual quiet back home. Also, I don't want to be told I'm wrong and have to make a new theory." Lassiter raised an eyebrow in question and she shrugged, knowing it didn't really make sense. She glanced up at the clock and stood. "Holy crap, it's after midnight. I need to go to sleep," she said, tugging his arm until he was standing, then ushering him toward the door.

"Are you kicking me out?" He asked, amused.

"Well I mean, you can stay if you want, the couch is actually super comfortable," she said, shrugging. "But I'm going to sleep now and I talk in my sleep so if you are a light sleeper you'll be up all night." He chuckled as he slid his shoes on. She looked at her feet as he straightened, suddenly feeling a little awkward. "And, um, thanks for coming up here with me. I'm pretty sure I would have freaked out a little after… all that… if I was by myself." Lassiter smiled and shrugged.

"What are friends for?" He asked, then opened the door. She grinned as he left, glad he was finally admitting to having friends.

* * *

The next morning Aislinn woke to her alarm at six, showered, dressed, then headed over to Shawn's apartment to wake him up. After ten minutes of banging on the door and shouting, he finally let her in.

"Get dressed!" She said, seeing that he was only wearing boxers and a t-shirt. "It's already 7:15 and it takes ten minutes to drive there. We need to leave. Now."

Shawn groaned something as a response, but he caught the clothes she threw at him and went into his bathroom to change. Five minutes later she was dragging him to her car and ignoring his whining about wanting to stop for smoothies. They met up with the whole group in the Home Depot parking lot and got out of the car just in time to follow them inside the building.

"Okay," the chief said, letting agent Ewing and Lindsay Leikin walk ahead of them. "You are all instructed to cooperate fully with the federal agents but I'll be damned if we're gonna get shown up on our own turf. They may be the feds, but we are a team and this is our town. They will need us."

Aislinn sighed and hung back a little, letting the others walk ahead of her.

"Are you an idiot?" Agent Ewing was saying when Aislinn caught up to them. She shook her head, half ashamed to be seen with this particular group. "Don't answer that. If I plopped a Granny Smith apple down on this counter and carved a 100 on it, would you accept that as legal tender? Don't answer that. Do you know what microprinting is?"

"I'm confused, should I answer that?" The cashier asked, and Aislinn chuckled a little.

"The introduction of microprinting as an anti-replicant feature began in 1990 with the addition of the words "United States of America" printed around Ben Franklin's lapel. In addition, the words 'U.S. 100' are printed within the lines of the lower left 100," Agent Ewing was slowly showing them all a $100 bill to illustrate his lecture. Aislinn sighed, really hoping that she would be able to leave soon. Not only was she tired, but she didn't really see what use she could be in this case without actually touching one of the fake bills.

"I'm sorry," Shawn began, his voice obviously sarcastic. "Is it just me, or is this unbearable boring? I don't know how Ms. Leikin works, but Gus and I are going to investigate the body of the store and search for our culprit's twisted, wretched, filthy aura. Because that is what serious psychics do." Aislinn cleared her throat from her place behind the chief. "And Aislinn is coming along too." She grinned and followed the other two away from the register.

"That guy should teach university classes, he's boring enough," Aislinn said, shaking her head as they walked away.

"No kidding," Gus said as Shawn wandered away. "I was ready to fall asleep right there." They turned down the next isle, then turned around, looking for Shawn. "Shawn!" Gus shouted, seeing him using a lift to get above the isles. "What are you doing?"

"Shawn?" someone else asked, and Gus frowned, then the two of them walked over to the next isle only to find Henry, also yelling at his son.

"Dad!" Shawn said, grinning. "Wow you look so tiny down there."

"Shawn you are only ten feet above us, we don't look any smaller," Aislinn said.

"What the hell are you doing up there?" Henry asked, hands on his hips.

"What does it look like I'm doing?" Shawn asked, grinning. "We're making a case. A federal one."

"Oh, of course you are," Henry said sarcastically. "Well, when you've finished wrapping things up for the pentagon, I want you at my house. I got a project for you."

"Afraid we're gonna be a little busy having our pictures taken with the President of the United States of America," Shawn said.

"That won't happen Shawn," Aislinn said, rolling her eyes.

"Oh, I think you'll be there," Henry said. "You owe me."

"I owe you?" Shawn asked incredulously.

"Yeah, for the last 12 times I helped you solve one of your little cases. You agreed," Henry said.

"Gus, did I agree to that?" Shawn asked.

"Well, technically I think you did," Gus said after a little deliberating.

"We will be there Mr. Spencer," Aislinn promised. He shook his head and walked away. "Get down Shawn. We need to do some investigating."

"Fine," Shawn grumbled, lowering the lift.

When he was on the ground he began leading them toward the back of the store, then up a staircase that said 'employee's only'.

"They aren't just going to let anyone look at the tapes Shawn," Gus said as they followed Shawn down a hallway. He pulled open the door that said 'security' on it and walked inside.

"Can I help you guys?" The man at the screen asked, turning around at their entrance.

"Hello, Garrison," Shawn said, reading the man's name tag. "We're working on the counterfeiting case and we need to see all of yesterday's security footage."

"How do you know my name's Garrison?" The man asked, his face confused. Aislinn almost laughed, but managed to keep a straight face as Shawn leaned over and whispered something to Gus.

"I'm sorry man, I didn't mean to freak you out. My name is Shawn Spencer. I'm a psychic with the police department," Shawn said, grinning the entire time.

"There was already a psychic here last night. From Washington no less," he said.

"Told you we should have come yesterday," Aislinn muttered.

"She looked at all the tapes and there was no positive ID," Garrison continued.

"She already came here, huh?" Shawn asked.

"And she's good," the man said, grinning now. "She also knew my name was Garrison."

"Uh, you mind if I take a peek anyway? I work a little differently than her. My process is a little more complex," Shawn said. "I can sometimes pick up images that are underneath the epidermal layer." Aislinn shook her head, but the man seemed to buy it. He turned back to his computer, pulling up the footage from yesterday.

"Here it is," he said, beginning to play through it all. "This is the tape of the counterfeiter she looked at last night. You know, honestly, of that pretty lady psychic couldn't pick anything up, I can't imagine you're going to have much luck."

"You know what, you're probably right," Shawn said a few moments later. "We gave it a shot. Thanks, Garrison."

"Well that was useless," Gus said when they were back in the main part of the store. They went back to the register where agent Ewing was still talking to the man who had helped the counterfeiter the previous day.

"Tall? Short? Age? Race?" Ewing was asking. The man at the counter was just shrugging by that point, not even bothering to answer the questions. "Do you mean to tell me that the only thing you can remember clearly is that he was a man?"

"And technically, I can't even be sure of that, now, can I?" The man said, infuriating agent Ewing even more. Aislinn had to use her hand to cover her smile.

"Wait," Shawn said, lifting a hand to his head. "I'm getting something. He did not wear corrective lenses."

"Actually, that is true," the cashier said, nodding.

"Okay, well, that's something to go on," the chief said, nodding in approval. "Good work, Mr. Spencer."

"Great and so we're looking for someone in Santa Barbara who does not wear glasses," Carlton said sarcastically.

"He- He had a small scar," Lindsay said, lifting her hand to mirror Shawn's earlier actions. "About three inches, on the jaw line. And he wore a single stud diamond in his left ear"

"Yes," the cashier said, beginning to smile now. "And yes. She's exactly right. I can see that clearly now."

"That's why she's the best," Ewing said, smirking a the chief.

"Tough break," Juliet said, turning to follow the chief from the building.

"What about you Ms. Kelly, are you sensing anything?" The chief asked as she walked. Aislinn picked up her pace to catch up with the woman.

"I have to touch things that he's touched in order to get any sort of reading," Aislinn said. "And even then, I can't see the future, only past things."

"Alright," the chief said, then she turned to Juliet and Aislinn fell to the back of the group with Shawn.

"So what now?" She asked, glancing over at them.

"Text Lassie to check the outside security cameras for a Nissan. Probably a Murano, maybe a Sentra," Shawn said.

"I don't have Lassiter's number," Aislinn said. "You do it."

"Yes you do, I put it in your phone yesterday along with Juliet's number and the chiefs," Shawn said.

"Why?" Aislinn asked, frowning. When had she left her phone unattended yesterday?

"Just in case. Now, lets go to my dads," Shawn said, following her to her car as she pulled out her phone to text Lassiter.

"Gus, where's your car?" Aislinn asked, noticing that Gus was still following them.

"At the station. I caught a ride with Lassiter and Juliet," he said, getting into the front seat.

"Hey, I get shotgun," Shawn whined.

"You didn't call it," Gus said, shutting his door and pushing down the lock button. Shawn climbed into the backseat to continue complaining.

"It was implied since we came here without you," Shawn said, Aislinn shook her head and started the car.

"Implied shotgun is only for the significant other of the driver or for older family members," Gus said, crossing his arms.

"That's not a rule!" Shawn said.

Their argument continued all the way to Shawn's dad's house. Henry grinned as he let them in, obviously a little surprised Shawn had actually shown up. He led them into his living room and smiled broadly as he handed a sheet of paper to Shawn.

"Dad, I'm confused," Shawn said after a few seconds of staring at the paper. "These are plans for a wet bar."

"Yeah, that's right," Henry said, crossing his arms over his chest in an imposing way. "For entertaining."

"Right," Shawn said. "But I don't see anywhere in the plans the portal into 1976."

"Shawn, a wet bar happens to be a timeless home feature," Henry said.

"He's right," Aislinn said, chuckling. "My parents house had one."

"Right, perfect for those warm summer evenings when Reggie Jackson and Dylan Cannon swing by for Harvey Wallbangers," Shawn said, snickering.

"Shawn, are you gonna crack wise or are you gonna get to work?" Henry asked, rolling his eyes.

"I feel like it should be noted that neither Gus, nor Aislinn, nor myself are licensed plumbers,: Shawn said.

"Yes I understand that Shawn," Henry said. "I've already installed the sink, all you two have to do is connect the fittings."

"Two?" Shawn asked, frowning.

"Yeah, Aislinn doesn't owe me," Henry said. "She's never asked me for help on any cases."

"Awesome," Aislinn said, grinning at the boys and following Henry into the kitchen. She could hear both Shawn and Gus complaining as she left.

"Beer?" Henry asked, opening the fridge.

"No thanks, I'm the driver today," Aislinn said. "Are you sure you don't want me to go make sure they aren't breaking anything?"

"Nah, they'll be fine," Henry said, sitting down at the table with his can of beer. "So, you are a real psychic then?"

"Yeah," Aislinn said, taking the seat across from him.

"Prove it," Henry said skeptically, crossing his arms and leaning his chair back. Aislinn smiled bitterly.

"Give me your hand," she said, pulling off her thin gloves and sticking them into her pockets. He raised an eyebrow and leaned forward.

"Don't tell me you read palms," he said, his face settling on disbelieving amusement.

"Nah," she said, taking both hands in hers and closing her eyes to focus on blocking out the memories and listening to the thoughts instead. It came much faster, and easier, than it had last week when she had last practiced it. She listened for a moment, trying to make since of the disjointed sentences people thought in most of the time. "You think I'm a fake," she said, smiling a little.

"That's obvious," Henry said.

"And you are currently a little hungry, you're thinking about using the left over ham in your fridge to make a sandwich but you are also considering cooking up the trout in the freezer and just having the leftovers tomorrow. You think your beer is kinda disgusting and you only bought it because it was on sale. Now you are looking around the room wondering what gave away the fish and the leftovers." Her eyes were still closed, but she could tell he was scanning for every possible way to prove her wrong. "You think much the same as Shawn does, picking up all the little details and letting your brain turn them into useful information. It's a very unique way of thinking. Oh, now you are starting to consider that I might not be a fake but the real deal, though you really don't want to believe that, which is totally fine, I get it. You are also considering that I may just be a very dedicated stalker, which I'm not, I can assure you. Now you are counting backwards from forty, not sure why." She dropped his hands and opened her eyes.

"Well," Henry said, a little dumbfounded. "That is a little convincing, all things considered. So what, you read minds or something?"

"Only when I'm touching someone. And I see memories too," Aislinn said, shrugging. "I don't tell the future or any of that crap, though it would be a little hypocritical of me to say thats impossible."

"Huh," Henry said, and Aislinn could guess that he was probably still trying to explain the possibility of mind reading. She smiled. "Well, the horse races are on, I'm gonna go watch them."

"I'll come too," Aislinn said, standing. "I don't want to listen to dumb and dumber argue about the proper way to build a wet bar." Henry laughed, then led her to the living room and flipped on the tv. They watched for almost an hour, Aislinn using games on her phone to entertain herself since the horse races were as boring as watching paint dry, then Henry changed the channel to baseball, which to Aislinn was just as boring, maybe worse. That went on for another hour.

"I need to go into work," Gus said, walking into the room with Shawn.

"Great, I'll drive you to your car," Aislinn said, jumping up with a sigh of relief. She wasn't sure how much more baseball she could stand.

"Can you take me back to the office?" Shawn asked.

"Did you finish the bar?" Henry asked, looking up from the couch. Shawn began to nod, then shook his head. "Go finish it, I'll drive you home later." Shawn groaned then stomped away like a child while Aislinn laughed.

"See you later Mr. Spencer," Aislinn said, following Gus out the door.

"Lets stop for food," Gus said once they were back in her car.

"Don't you have to get to work?" Aislinn asked, looking behind her as she backed out of the driveway.

"Nah, that was just an excuse to leave," Gus said, grinning. Aislinn laughed. They stopped for tacos on the way to the station, then Gus left after telling her about the car dealership lead. Aislinn went back to her apartment and dressed for bed even though it was barely past four in the afternoon, then spent the rest of the evening on her couch watching lifetime movies and trying not to cry during them.

* * *

"Aislinn!" Shawn called in a sing song voice through her apartment. She sat up in bed and blinked at him for a moment, then frowned.

"How did you get in here?" She asked, speaking through a yawn. She flopped back down and pulled her covers over her head.

"Key under the mat," Shawn said.

"I didn't leave a key under the mat," she said, her voice muffled by the blanket.

"Well the previous tenant must have," he said, and she could almost hear the grin. She uncovered her face and blinked against the light.

"What do you want?" She asked when he didn't say anything.

"Get up. We are going car shopping," he said, grinning as he jumped across the room.

"How are you so energetic this early in the morning?" She grumbled, but got out of bed anyway. "And what time is it anyway?"

"Just before seven," Shawn said. "And to answer your question its not morning for me since I haven't slept."

"Shawn," Aislinn said, frowning as she stopped in her motions of gathering clothes. "Why haven't you slept?"

"Eh," Shawn said, shrugging but not answering the question. Aislinn walked into the bathroom to dress, leaving the door open a crack to continue the conversation.

"That Lindsay Leikin woman is really bothering you isn't she?" Aislinn asked, pulling on her clothes.

"It's not that," Shawn called. She heard a faint clanking sound and hurried to finish dressing before he could break any of her things. "Well, I guess it sort of is. I just don't understand how she's doing it. I mean, she's not like you, she's like me, I think." Aislinn straightened her shirt and opened the door to find him fiddling with something on her dresser. She went over and pulled the little jewelry box from his hands.

"I can find out if you want… she doesn't know about me, right?" Aislinn offered, feeling the self doubt and intense curiosity lacing the memories he had just left on the box from touching it.

"Not unless you told her," Shawn said, serious for once. "I didn't say anything since I know you like to be kept out of it."

"Thanks," Aislinn said, twisting her fingers together. "Though I guess Lassiter could have told her too. I'm assuming he didn't since the chief wants us to solve the case first."

"Lassie doesn't believe in psychics," Shawn said, back to his hyper self. He practically skipped from the bedroom to the kitchen, Aislinn following behind at a more reasonable pace.

"I suppose not," Aislinn said, sighing. Shawn had fished around in a cupboard and pulled out a tea bag, holding it out to her. She smiled, wondering if he realized she had never actually told him she liked tea in the morning and that the only reason he knew that is because of the memories she had given him. She accepted it and put a mug of water in the microwave to heat, then turned back to him as she waited. "Lassiter and I had a conversation about that a few days ago," she said, not looking directly at him now. Shawn had become very still and she could feel his eyes on her.

"Did you tell him anything about, uh, me?" Shawn asked. She smiled reassuringly and looked up at him.

"Just that you are helping me learn how to use my gift, nothing more," she said, taking the cup from the microwave right before the timer went off. "I explained to him a little of how my gift works, or how I think it works anyway," she paused, frowning, then held out her hand to him. "Here." He took the offered hand and she shoved the memory of the conversation into his head so he would be sure she hadn't told his secret. He closed his eyes for a few moments after she had dropped his hand, going through the memory. She sipped her tea as she waited, then smiled again as he opened his eyes.

"Why was he even at your house?" Shawn asked, raising an eyebrow. His tone was joking but his face looked serious. She frowned.

"Do you want to know every minute of my life?" She asked, her voice carefully even. Her mother had done the same thing, though she had been much more demanding about it. Every time Aislinn had left the house her mother wanted to see all her memories from the day to make sure that Aislinn hadn't made any tiny slip ups that could expose her. It became such a hassle that, after high school, Aislinn had rarely bothered to leave the house at all, and when she did she hardly spoke to anyone.

"No," Shawn said, sighing. "I just wouldn't put it past Lassiter to try to coerce you into telling him about me or using you to spy on me or something," Shawn said, and Aislinn let out a sigh of relief as he returned tot he normally carefree seeming person he usually was.

"He's not a bad guy, Shawn," Aislinn said, rolling her eyes. "We ran into each other at the bar down the street and I invited him up for dinner. We had ramen noodles since I haven't been grocery shopping in a few weeks and had nothing else here."

"Well I expect to be the best man at your wedding," Shawn said, grinning. Aislinn rolled her eyes and elbowed him in the stomach lightly.

"Why did you wake me up so early? The car dealership probably doesn't even open till 9," Aislinn said, finishing off her tea and rinsing the mug.

"I know, but I was bored," Shawn said, grinning again.

"Well, how about next time you're bored you go down to the office and clean it up a bit?" Aislinn suggested, slipping her shoes on.

"Nah, then we'll have nothing to do tomorrow," Shawn said, following after her. She sighed at the failed effort, then began walking out to her car. They were halfway to the grocery store before Shawn thought to question where they were going, then he spent the whole trip complaining about having to carry things.

"This is your own fault you know," Aislinn said as they stood in her kitchen putting away the groceries. "If you hadn't woken me up early and then reminded me I had no groceries, you wouldn't have to be doing all this hard work." Shawn grumbled as he bunched up the empty plastic bags.

"Can we just go to the dealership now please?" He asked, pouting.

"I guess so," Aislinn said, looking at her watch. It was only 8:30, but with driving time they would probably get there around nine.

"Great," he said, back to his exuberant self. "We just have to stop and get Gus first."

"Doesn't he work today?" Aislinn asked, frowning as she followed him out to her car again.

"Nope, it's saturday," he said, chuckling.

"Really? I thought it was friday," Aislinn said, frowning. Not having a regular job was really throwing off her sense of what day it was.

Shawn chatted at her all the way to Gus's place, and then they both talked, or argued, the rest of the way to the dealership. They ended up getting there half an hour after they opened for the day, and Aislinn stood back, preferring to let Shawn and Gus do most of the talking and investigating. The two boys whispered to each other as they all walked into the building. Aislinn hung back to look at the car nearest the door as they walked up to an employee nearby. She leaned her face down, letting her hair fall in front of it, then watched them from the corner of her eye.

"Excuse me, my buddy here is interested in the banana yellow Ferrari, though he is neither gay nor European," Shawn said, and Aislinn almost shook her head. She briefly wondered if his outrageous antics ever actually got him anyway, then realized that if they didn't, he probably wouldn't use them so often. The employee and the woman turned around, and Aislinn frowned, recognizing Lindsay Leikin. She glanced around the building again and spotted the rest of their group in one of the offices, shaking their heads at Shawn. Gus and Shawn were whisper fighting and she walked up to them, grabbing their arms and turning them towards the office.

"So whats going on? No one calls us anymore, that's the new thing? I thought we were a team," Shawn said as they led the office and approached them. Agent Ewing and Lindsay Leikin walked across the wide room to talk to another employee.

"Yeah, first of all, the whole 'team' thing? She wasn't talking to you," Lassiter said, scowling at Shawn. "And secondly, Ewing didn't call me. He called O'Hara."

"It's not like I asked him to," Juliet said, noticing Lassiter's glare and Shawn's raised eyebrow, both directed at her. Aislinn noticed two employees talking a little ways away and stepped behind Shawn and Gus, trying to listen to their conversation. All she caught was enough to piece together that they though the man was an idiot for returning the car and only taking the almost half price he had been offered for it. She was brought back into the conversation when someone mentioned her name.

"Just catch Mr. Spencer, Mr. Guster, and Ms. Kelly up on what Ms. Leikin was able to figure out," the chief said.

"Apparently our guy came in here, bought a used Lamborghini for $47,000 in cash," Lassiter said, falling into a reporting mode.

"Next day, he tries to return it. All sales are final, but the sales manager makes a concession, offering mere $26,000 in cash," Juliet continued.

"He accepts it?" Gus asked, frowning. "What kind of idiot is this guy?"

"A genius idiot, according to the feds," the chief said.

"You see, those familiar with this sort of thing know that it's the classic grift," Lassiter said smugly. "Essentially, he traded 47 Gs of worthless paper for $26,000 in cold, hard cash. I've seen it before."

"Where?" Shawn asked sarcastically. "In a Mamet play?" Aislinn reached over to touch the back of his hand just long enough to tell him to play nice. He rolled his eyes at her but didn't continue the quip.

"Any witnesses?" Gus asked. Aislinn looked back up to join the conversation only to see Lassiter raise an eyebrow at her and half nod toward her hand. She shrugged.

"No," Juliet answered. "But a yellow Lamborghini was spotted outside of town in Goleta, but it was moving too fast to make an ID. You know I don't think he's a swimmer," she continued, now distracted by the two agents approaching them. "He's not really that build. I bet he plays rugby." Aislinn turned to look behind her.

"Maybe soccer," she added, now standing next to Juliet.

"Oh, maybe," Juliet said, sighing. She turned to Aislinn, her eyes lighting up a little as Lassiter and the boys crossed the room to meet the others in the middle. "Want to get that lunch we talked about today?"

"Sure," Aislinn said, smiling. "It'll be nice to go out with someone who can eat without getting food on their clothes," she said, nodding towards Shawn and Gus. Juliet chuckled as they walked over to join the group.

"Look, if anyone want's to join me, I'm going to be taking a look at some of the bills from the safe that didn't get deposited," Ewing was saying. Aislinn perked up a little, paying more attention to the conversation. If they had actual bills that the counterfeiter had touched, maybe she could be useful to the investigation after all. She followed them into the office at the dealership, then watched as Ewing and the dealership owner went over the bills, laying them out on the desk. Ewing held one up, talking over how to tell it was fake, and she waited until they were distracted by the bill he held to reach out and touch one herself, glad she hadn't taken her gloves with her this morning. She saw a few flashes of cars and people, then of a dryer and ink and paper, but the man must have been wearing gloves when he touched the money. She sighed and let her hand fall back to her side as they all turned back to the bills on the table. She skirted around them to stand next to Shawn and touched his arm to tell him what she had learned from the bill she had touched. He gave her a small nod after she dropped her arm and she lifted it again to silently apologize for not finding more.

'It's fine,' Shawn thought to her, turning a little towards her. She dropped her hand before he could continue the conversation and she turned to leave the room and wait outside since they were almost finished here. They drove back to the Psych office in silence, Aislinn not in the mood to talk and the boys probably thinking about the case. Shawn stopped her outside the office as Gus went inside.

"Look, I know how you are feeling, I can sense it when you talk to me in my mind," Shawn began, and Aislinn looked away. "You aren't useless Aislinn. I understand why you don't want to be the center of attention, and it's fine, no one blames you for not solving every single case that domes through the station. You help us when we need it, and that's enough." She sighed, then shrugged.

"I just want to be doing more to help I guess," she said, tucking her hands into her pockets and hunching her shoulders a little. "I mean, whats the point of doing… what I can do, if I'm not solving cases and helping you catch the bad guys?"

"You are helping," he repeated, grabbing her shoulder and shaking it a little. "Besides, maybe you aren't meant to be catching bad guys. Maybe you're meant for something else."

"I guess," she said, agreeing mostly so the conversation could end rather than that she actually believed what he was saying. He sighed, but let the subject drop anyway, then turned to enter the office.

* * *

After nearly two hours of following Shawn around the office and cleaning up the messes he made, Aislinn left to meet Juliet for lunch at the little cafe near the station. Juliet was already waiting at a table when she got there.

"Hey," Aislinn said, sliding into the booth across from Juliet.

"Hi," Juliet said, smiling. "I'm sorry, but I can't stay too long. Agent Ewing wants to continue the investigation right after lunch."

"No problem," Aislinn said, smiling. She ordered lunch from the waitress that came by, then turned back to Juliet, a little cautious. "So, why did you want to have lunch?"

"Oh, well, there are only four women who work at the station, and since you are working with Shawn now, I thought it would be nice to get to know you a little," Juliet said. Her voice was calm, but she was absentmindedly peeling the label off of a water bottle she held in her lap.

"I suppose it would be nice," Aislinn said, smiling reassuringly. "And it'll probably be nice to have a friend outside of work. Well, sort of outside of work." Julied grinned and nodded.

They spent the next twenty or so minutes chatting about nothing too important, and then Juliet headed back to the station and Aislinn went to meet Shawn any Gus. She was surprised to find them in the parking lot by Gus's car rather than back at the office.

"I thought we would save you the drive and meet you here," Shawn said, grinning.

"Meet me here for what?" Aislinn asked, confused.

"Well, I'm assuming they are still working on the case…" Shawn said, forming the words into a question.

"Oh, yeah," Aislinn said, nodding. "Juliet said they were continuing right after lunch."

"Hm, and again they didn't bother to call us," Gus mumbled under his breath as they walked up the steps to the station. They found the group sitting at the conference table in the room next to the chiefs office, and Aislinn stayed by the door as Shawn and Gus went in to sit at the table with them. The group fell silent as they entered and Aislinn saw Juliet mouth 'sorry' at her from her seat.

"Finally, some nice seats, huh?" Shawn said. "This is what I'm talking about." He looked around, noticing the uncomfortable looks on everyone's faces and Aislinn figured out what Juliet had been apologizing for. Psych must have been kicked off the case. "What?" Shawn asked as the silence continued. "Did I just sit in something? Gus, do I have pudding on my jeans?" He half stood, turning his back to Gus. Aislinn shook her head, realizing that Shawn had already figured out they weren't wanted there and that he must have a plan to get them back onto the case.

"No, no," Gus said, looking around the table slowly.

"Nothing?" Shawn asked, trying to see the back of his jeans.

"Shawn, I think we're not welcomed here," Gus said, slowly standing from his chair as Shawn plopped back down into his. The table continued to be silent.

"Gus, don't be a paranoid schizophrenic, we're always welcomed here," Shawn said, grinning around the table.

"No, look," Gus said, nodding to the chief who lowered her head.

"Oh my god," Shawn said, frowning now. "We're not welcome."

"It's nothing personal Mr. Spencer. Special agent Ewing just feels that Ms. Leikin has things covered on the psychic front," the chief said. "And I have to agree with him."

"Okay, we can take a hint," Shawn said, looking forlorn as he stood. "Certainly don't need to be told twice."

"I think you were just told three times," Gus said, frowning at the table.

"You know what, this is fine," Shawn said, holding his hands up in defeat. "Because we had a good run."

"Thank you for the memories," Gus added, heading towards the door. When they reached Aislinn, Shawn turned around.

"Oh, just one more thing," he said, then paused dramatically for a few seconds. "You might want to check the cash from the dealership, because it's not all counterfeit."

"That's ridiculous," Ewing said. "If I had learned to laugh as a child I would right now. I looked at those bills myself. Do you really want to go against the leading special agent in counterfeiting with 14 years of experience under his belt and say that those bills weren't fake?"

"Not all of them," Shawn said, grinning now. "Just one. And I believe the serial number was…" he paused to lift his hand to his head in his 'psychic' pose as Juliet pulled uout a pad of paper and a pencil to copy down the numbers. "ALD 975708077." He turned and led Gus and Aislinn out of the room and down the hallway towards the door.

Where are we going?" Aislinn asked, walking quickly to keep up with them. "Shouldn't we have stayed until they checked the bills out?"

"Wait for it," Shawn half sang, continuing to walk. "Wait for it."

"Spencer," Lassiter called, and they turned to see the chief, Juliet, and Lassiter coming towards them. "Hold up."

"The bill checked out," Juliet said. "It's real."

"All right," Ewing said, walking up to Shawn angrily. "Answer me this Mr. Psychic. Why would a counterfeiter ever use real bills?"

"Because he had to," Shawn said, then he looked over at Gus and smirked. "Man, I read your informational packet cover to cover. Our guy spends six to eight days in every city. We're only on day four. Quite simply, he ran out of dough. He didn't know what kind of deal he'd be able to make on the car. Turns out, short one bill, lucky for us."

"So what's our next move?" The chief asked.

"Well, I'll call Washington and begin-" Ewing began, but the chief cut him off.

"I'm sorry, I was asking Mr. Spencer," she said, turning toward Shawn. Shawn put on a fake surprised look.

"Oh, you want to know what I think his next move is?" He asked. "Oh Gus, look, she wants-" Aislinn elbowed him lightly in the side to get him back on track. "Well lets see here," he said, turning to the chief. "He's gotta print more money. My guess is he, uh, set up shop here in town. So we find his little nest, we find him." The chief nodded and led agent Ewing and Lindsay away. Lassiter followed them and Juliet turned to Aislinn.

"I'm sorry, if I had known they were going to kick you off the case I would have told you at lunch," Juliet said, looking worried.

"Don't worry about it," Aislinn said, smiling. "We aren't off the case so there's no problem."

"Great," Juliet said, grinning, then turning to follow after Lassiter.

"Well, I've worked up an appetite and we haven't had lunch yet," Shawn said, draping an arm over Aislinn's shoulder and turning her toward the exit.

"Shawn, we had hot dogs two hours ago," Gus said, frowning at him as they left the station.

"Exactly, Gus, two whole hours ago," Shawn said.

"Well you and Gus can get food on your own," Aislinn said, shrugging his arm from her shoulder. "I'm going to go home for a while, I have a load of laundry in the washer."

"You are so boring Aislinn," Shawn said, shaking his head.

"Well, Shawn, if you ever washed your clothes you would realize how important it is to not let them sit in the washer for too long," Aislinn said, walking backwards toward her car as Shawn and Gus walked away from her. He ignored her and got into Gus's car, so she turned, smiling, and got into her own to drive home.

* * *

Aislinn woke the next morning to a text from Shawn sent a few minutes after six. All it read was '8:30' which, if he meant morning, was only a little over half an hour away.

'Don't you ever sleep? What's at 8:30?' She replied, then dressed as she waited for the answer.

'B psych.'

She shook her head, wondering if it really would have taken him much longer to fully type out the words.

She pulled up to the office, a little proud of herself for getting there on time even though she'd had short notice.

"Hey Shawn. What's so important that-" she paused, spotting Lindsay Leikin sitting in Shawn's desk chair while Shawn paced around the room. Aislinn looked at Shawn for answer but he was busy thinking. "Um, hi. What's going on?" She asked Lindsay, her voice quieter and a little cautious.

"It's fine," Shawn said, still pacing. "She's on our side now."

"Why?" Aislinn asked, skirting around Shawn's desk to get to her own.

"We decided last night that we would be more effective working together to find this guy," Shawn said. "We are meeting the calvary at a hotel near the beach that we figured out he might be staying at sometime this afternoon."

Aislinn watched Lindsay's face while Shawn talked, trying to guess if she had any hidden motives. After a few seconds she shrugged.

"Cool," she said, kicking her feet up into her desk. She decided she would keep an eye on Lindsay, even though Shawn now seemed to trust her. There was just something about Lindsay that Aislinn didn't like, though she wasn't sure what it was. "So why are we here now if we aren't meeting till this afternoon?"

"Lindsay and I are going to practice our 'joint vision' performance," Shawn said, grinning. "I texted you because I know you always wake up around eight and I figured you would need something to do." Aislinn sighed, but had to agree. Now that she had gotten her apartment set up how she wanted it, she was bored a lot of the time.

She found a book she had left in her desk and began reading it as Lindsay and Shawn talked. She ignored them both for the most part, only paying attention of someone said her name. From what she could gather, Shawn hadn't told Lindsay about her ability, and had only called her there in case they needed to drive somewhere for 'vision research'. Airline knew he must have had some other motive since she knew his motorcycle could support two passengers. Gus arrived a little before noon and brought Chinese takeout for everyone. He didn't look surprised to see Lindsay there so either Shawn had texted him about it, or he had been there last night. At ten minutes till one, Lindsay stood, claiming that Ewing had messaged her to meet at the hotel at one. Gus took Lindsay in his car while Shawn insisted that they would need two cars.

"Okay, what's really going on?" Aislinn asked once they were alone in her car. "We all could have got in one car, and I know you didn't need me there this morning."

"Perceptive," Shawn said, grinning. "Honestly, I'm not too sure about Lindsay's motives yet and I wanted someone else there to give an opinion."

"Well she seems eager enough to get your opinions on the case," Aislinn said, keeping her eyes on the road.

"But?" Shawn prompted.

"I dunno," Aislinn said, shrugging. "There's just something about her that seems a little off. It's probably nothing though." Shawn nodded but didn't have anything else to add.

They arrived at the hotel at the same time Lassiter's car and the chief pulled up. Gus and Lindsay had beaten them there and were both waiting near the lobby door. Aislinn fell into her usual place at the back of he group as they entered the hotel, hanging back to look around. She rejoined the group as Lassiter and Ewing started to get into a fight, but Juliet stepped between them to stop it.

"Look, we need to know who's payed with cash or travelers checks recently," Juliet was saying in a slightly angry voice.

"My god, your a fire cracker," Ewing said, leaning closer to Juliet who took a step back out of habit.

"It would probably be easier to ask who didn't," the desk person said, frowning at them.

"I'm sorry?" Juliet asked, ignoring Shawn as he came to lean on the counter.

"This is a hotel, we're a cash business. Lots of European travelers," the man said in a condescending tone. "With what foreign credit card companies charge these days, cash is king."

"The south tower," Juliet asked, pretending to trip sideways into Lassiter, who pushed him off with a growl. "I see him. In the south tower."

"How many rooms in the south tower?" Ewing asked the desk man.

"There are 170," he said, looking warily at Shawn form the corner of his eye. Lassiter and Ewing argued over how best to go about searching all the rooms for a moment, but Shawn interrupted again.

"Filthy sheets," he exclaimed, flapping his hands about. "I see dirty, filthy sheets."

"Yes, and towels in the floor," Lindsay added, raising her hands to the side of her head like Shawn did sometimes.

"And a mediocre half eaten turkey club sandwich," Shawn said, calming down a little. "And he's refused maid service. He's isolated. He's in a less desirable room that's not facing the ocean," Shawn continued, his fingers to his temple. "Do you have any rooms facing the parking lot?"

"A few," the desk man said, looking down at his computer.

"He's in one of those," Shawn said confidently.

"Let's see," the man said, scrolling through a page in the computer. "French woman. Another French party. Here. Here's a single gentleman, paid all on cash, corner room facing the alley. And according to this he's never taken his 'do not disturb' sign off his door." As the man was talking, Aislinn saw Shawn steal a few pieces of cary out of a bowl on the counter, then hold his fist up for Gus to bump when he realized they had probably found the guy.

"Room number!" Ewing shouted.

"Key!" Lassiter shouted at the same time, holding his hand out to the man.

"Nice job psychics," Ewing said. "Let's get to work."

The man made a room key and handed it to Lassiter, and then the two men took off down the hall, both trying to be the first one to the guys room. The rest of the party caught up with them as the opened the room door and followed them inside.

"That's a really cute front loader," Juliet said, noticing the washer and dryer in the room.

"Thanks," Ewing said to her, and she glanced at him in surprise, then caught Aislinn's eye and covered her laugh with a hand. Aislinn shook her head at the mans flirting, then looked around he empty room. "He prints the money, then he washes it here to soften it. Then he tumbles it dry and beats it up with some stones to give it that natural, worn texture."

"Dude," Shawn whispered to Gus, leaning in. Aislinn walked over to them to hear the conversation. "There's linen fibers in that paper. What was he doing, amending the constitution?"

"You can't print money on regular paper, Shawn," Aislinn whispered, leaning in.

"That's government issue," Gus added, spotting the empty paper ream in the closet that Shawn had noticed.

"I'm getting a visual," Lindsay said, getting everyones attention. "He printed a batch of about 50,000, which will last hims while."

"Five bills a sheet," Ewing said, picking up an open ream of paper. "At least 80 sheets missing from this ream, that founds about right."

"Wait," Shawn said, holding out one arm and lifting the other to his head. "No, I'm getting more. I'm getting a lot more. Like 500,000, which would last more than just a while. Maybe a whole lifetime."

"That's not possible," Lindsay said, half smirking, thinking she had caught Shawn in a false vision.

"It is if you live in one of the baltic states," Shawn said, purposely misunderstanding her words.

"I'm just not getting that at all. Anything over 50,000 is just getting blocked from my receptors," she said, frowning. "Not a chance."

"Receptors, really?" Shawn mumbled to her as he approached the closet and turned to face Gus and Aislinn who still stood at the back of the room. He raised his hand and flailed around a little, reaching for the empty ream he couldn't see. Gus nodded his head in the direction of the paper until Shawn found it and pulled it in front of him with an overdramatic gasp.

"This would do it," Ewing said, taking the paper from Shawn's hands. "This is a 500-sheet ream, and it's likely he used it all." Lassiter had wandered over to the desk to look at something, and used a plastic 'evidence' bag to pick it up.

"Treasury seal," he said, then looked closer as Ewing came over to look at it.

"No. Passport seal," Ewing corrected, frowning.

"Uh, this guy's officially on the lam. We don't catch him now, we can kiss him goodbye," Shawn said, looking around the room stoically. Lassiter left the room, pulling out his phone while Juliet and the chief went over the rest of the room for anything they had missed.

"The railway stations, obviously the airport security has been notified, and all the interstate agencies are on alert," Lassiter said to the chief when they joined him in the hall. They all walked quickly, eager to get back to the station.

"They've all been given the sketch based on Ms. Leikin's description of the suspect," Juliet added. Aislinn joined Shawn and Gus as they started to fall to the back of the group.

"Okay, but please keep your phones on just in case we get any movement," the chief said, heading toward the doors.

"What's the point?" Shawn asked sulkily. "Nobody ever bothers to call us anymore." Lindsay turned around at his words but the rest ignored him and continued to their cars.

"Shawn, I don't do this much, but I just wanted to say thank you," Lindsay said, coming to a stop in front of their little group. "I know we haven't nailed the guy yet, but you were right, we make a good team."

"Yes we do," Shawn agreed, raising his eyebrows in surprise. "And hopefully tomorrow we'll wrap this thing up. Have a good night," He said, shaking her hand. She turned and headed toward the door.

"Wait for it," Shawn whispered to them. "Wait for it."

"Shawn," Lindsay said, turning around again. "I was thinking maybe we could go somewhere now, maybe continue working to see if we can;t stumble upon some collective apparition."

"That's a fantastic idea," Shawn said, smirking. "I love it. Where could we go at this hour that's still open? You know what, I think there's a Color Me Mine that stays open late." Aislinn rolled her eyes.

"You don't quit with the jokes do you," Lindsay said, smiling.

"I'm sorry, would you like me to stop?" Shawn asked.

"Not yet," Lindsay said, looking up at him. "I kinda like it. But actually I was thinking back to my hotel room?"

"You know, it's something we could try,' Shawn said, smiling. "I mean, not as fun as making ashtrays with our names on them, but yeah, I'm a flexible guy, a sportsman."

"Good," Lindsay said. "All right, I'll head back to freshen up. What do you say we meet at 2200 hours?"

"Perfect," Shawn said, then pretended to just notice Gus and Aislinn still standing there. "Oh, I'm so rude. Would you guys like to join us?"

"Well, I-" Gus started, but Shawn cut him off.

"That sucks," he said, draping an arm over Gus's shoulder. "So 2200 on the dot. I'll be there." He waited until Lindsay had walked away before turning back to Gus. "Dude, what time is 2200 hours?" Gus glared at him for a moment, then walked toward the doors. "Gus? Buddy, help me out. What is it? Is it like 11:00 times two? Buddy!" Shawn chased after Gus and Aislinn followed at a slower pace to find that Gus had ditched Shawn there. She laughed. "I can't believe he left," Shawn said sadly.

"Come on, I'll take you back to the office," Aislinn said. "2200 hours is 10:00 by the way."

"Why on earth would they call it 2200 hours then?" Shawn asked sully as he climbed into the car. Aislinn rolled her eyes. knowing very well that Shawn wasn't stupid and had already figured it out if he hadn't known to begin with.

"Because it's the 22nd hour in the day," Aislinn said anyway. "And Shawn…" she hesitated, not wanting to sound like she was looking out for him at all. "Be careful with Lindsay. She seems a little… I dunno. Off."

"She's fine," Shawn said, waving his hand in dismissal. Aislinn frowned but let it drop. She left Shawn at the Psych office then drove home in silence.

* * *

"Aislinn!" Shawn yelled through the phone the next morning. "We are coming by to pick you up in five minutes. They found the counterfeiters body in a warehouse off State."

"Shawn, I don't do dead people," Aislinn said, frowning as she rinsed out her cereal bowl from breakfast.

"Too late, we're downstairs, hurry," Shawn said, then hung up the phone before she could reply. She sighed, but went to get her shoes and purse, then went down to join them. The warehouse was only a five minute drive from her building, but the crime scene people were already there when they arrived.

"You wait until now to call us?" Shawn said, walking up to Lassiter, who had been looking at the body.

"I called you as soon as I heard," Lassiter said, fronting. "Do you really think I want Junior G-man here to beat me to the punch?"

"Well, it's affirmative," Ewing said, walking over to the body, Lindsay following after him. "Our counterfeiter," he said, nodding to the body. "Shot with his own gun. There are signs of a struggle." Shawn glanced at Aislinn, then half nodded toward the body. She shook her head and took a step back, silently telling him she really didn't want to touch him to see who the killer was. "Checks out as Steven J. Grabinski," Ewing continued. "His only prior charges are a couple counts of petty theft, and a small time fraud in Washington." As he spoke, Lindsay kneeled down next to him and held her hands over him, pretending to 'scan' him, then she touched his jacket, checking for anything under it.

"Whoa touchy," Lassiter said, and she jumped away from the dead man. "I don't know how you do it in Washington, but here we don't disturb the body till forensics has a chance to come in and collect some evidence."

":assiter ease u," the chief said, frowning. "We're lucky if our psychic doesn't lick the body." Shawn looked at Gus, then shrugged as though admitting it was something he would do. "Well, I guess congratulations are in order. We have to hand it to our federal agents here. Though we would have preferred to bring him in and charge him, this case looks pretty much wrapped up."

"There's no need to congratulate us for doing what is our job," Ewing said, though he was smiling smugly at Lassiter, who rolled his eyes and walked away. "We don't ask for commendation for what is merely our proud honor of servitude to our country. Perhaps just a small hug," he said, turning to Juliet. Juliet rolled her eyes and walked away, followed by the chief. "Just an itty0bitty one." He followed them from the room.

"So how'd you sleep?" Shawn said, turning to Lindsay. She looked away, almost guiltily. Aislinn frowned, wondering what and happened there. "Well, I guess I was right about one thing, it turned out to be a pretty good week for you." She turned and walked away without speaking, and Shawn, Gus, and Aislinn followed.

"You guys can go on ahead, I have some errands to run nearby," Aislinn said, then walked toward the street before Shawn and Gus could protest. She walked quickly to catch up to Lindsay, pulling a pen out of her pocket as she walked. "Hey," she said, grabbing Lindsay's bare arm. She took in the flash of memories from the woman as she turned to face her, then dropped her arm and held out the pen. "You dropped this."

"Oh, thanks," Lindsay said, then turned back to follow the chief to her car. Aislinn waited on the sidewalk, taking a few minutes to go through the memories she had gotten, cringing when she saw what Lindsay and Shawn had done last night, and again when she realize that Lindsay had been partners with the counterfeiter. She looked around the parking lot to see if Shawn and Gus were still there, but they had left, and she only belatedly realized that she had left her purse in their car, with her phone in it. She walked the mile to the station from the warehouse, arriving just as Lassiter and Juliet were getting back into their cars.

"Wait," Aislinn said, going over to them. "Where's Ewing and Leikin?"

"Packing their things," Juliet said. "We are going to see them off at the airfield now."

"Can I come with?" Aislinn asked. "I left my phone in Gus's car and I'm assuming they will probably be there."

"I hope not," Lassiter grumbled, getting into the car. Juliet smiled and gestured to the back door of the car, letting Aislinn know it was fine if she rode along. Gus's car was not at the airfield when they arrived, and Aislinn stood anxiously at the back of the group, hoping he would be there so she wouldn't have to pretend to have a vision. She grinned as she saw them running up, just as Ewing was beginning to climb the steps to the plane. Aislinn walked over to them as Shawn spotted off something about wanting to congratulate Lindsay in person. She touched his wrist, pouring the memories she had gotten into his mind just in case he hadn't figured everything out already. Since he was there and making a scene, she assumed he had figured something out.

'Thanks,' he thought to her, and she stepped back to let him do his thing.

"You deserve al the credit," Shawn continued to Lindsay. "You're amazing, she's an amazing person."

"Look Shawn, don't feel too bad, there will be other cases," Lindsay said, pulling her suitcase along to the base of the stairs.

Yeah yeah, I know," Shawn said. "But not for you. You see, it all started when you identified the scar on the jaw line of our counterfeiter, along with his little diamond stud earring. I mean, I couldn't even draw a hair color, so theres no way you could do that. Unless you'd already seen him before."

"This is ridiculous," Lindsay said, frowning now.

"Is it?" Shawn replied, getting into the full swing of the dramatic reveal. "It's not like I'm wearing a giant moose costume. I had a vision," he said, lifting his hand to his head. "You were drinking coffee."

"Oh, congratulations," Lindsay said sarcastically, rolling her eyes.

"But not at the hotel," Shawn continues, ignoring her. "You were driving past one Starbucks, two Starbucks, 17 Starbucks, and ended up all the way in Goleta. On the very same day that Grabinski's Lamborghini was spotted just outside of town in- Anypody? Special?" Shawn asked, pointing to Ewing.

"Goleta," he said slowly, realizing what Shawn was getting at.

"That's right," Shawn said, grinning. "Goleta. The two of you were partners and you were in touch the whole time. What's more, they were lovers int he night. I didn't think it was possible to fall in love with somebody in the span of five minutes. You said she got you close to the counterfeiter a month ago in Wilmette, Illinois, probably just missed him by five minutes," Shawn said, recalling what Ewing had said a few days ago. "You didn't miss him. She had him. She had you're bad boy red handed. Suddenly you were much more interested in combining forces and making a whole lot of money. And it was going well. It was going very well. Until you blew it. You know which moment I'm talking about right The one in the hotel room, when you realized he had printed way more than the 50,000 that you'd planned. And the passport?: He was looking at Lindsay now, but she was keeping her face straight. "So you called him that morning, you met him at the warehouse. It was you who struggled with him. And it was you who shot him dead, only then having your vision that miraculously led everyone to the crime scene."

"Oh come on," Lindsay said, treating the whole thing like a joke. "I mean, I've seen poor losers before but this is just sad."

"Your DNA was all over him," Shawn continued, ignoring her again. "But you covered your tracks by touching the body in front of everybody, before forensics had a chance to come in and brush it. OR comb it. Braid it. Maybe put it in pigtails." Aislinn hit his arm, snapping him back to the point he was trying to make. "That only leaves one outstanding issue. And that is 'Where's the rest of the money?' Wait a minute," Shawn said, making some jerking motions with his hands and acting as though he wasn't in control of himself. "What's happening? Whats happening to me?" He had walked closer to Lindsay. "I've heard about this. It's called spontaneous psychic Krav Maga." He kicked out, knocking over Lindsay's suitcase. "Oh my, it's the bag," Shawn cried. "Something's in the bag! It's bad. It's very bad. And it could be embarrassing." Ewing went over and unzipped the suitcase, flipping the top open to expose bundles of $100 bills.

"Well," Lindsay said, knowing there was no way to get out of it now. "You were wrong about one thing Shawn. I didn't sleep with you because you were my enemy. I did it because I really thought we had something."

"Okay. First of all, a little discretion would be nice all right? I mean, these are my coworkers," Shawn said, slightly embarrassed. "Secondly, anything we had, you ruined because you betrayed your gift, Leikin. You give a bad name to psychics like me who pride themselves on the purity of that gift. There are do many people out there who already doubt what we do, now you've given them all a reason to think we're fakes. You sicken me. I'm sickened," Shawn said, frowning. "I mean, sure, I'm still wildly attracted to you on the physical level." Aislinn elbowed him again. "But spiritually, and psychically, you're dead to me." He went to turn and walk away, but Lindsay lunged forward and wrapped an arm around his neck, pulling out a gun and pointing it at his head.

"I'm taking him, and I'm taking the plane," Lindsay yelled, slowly backing toward the stairs. Lassiter and Juliet had both pulled out their own guns, but there was no way they could shoot her since she was holding Shawn in front of her as a shield. Aislinn, seeing that Lindsays attention was on the detectives with guns and not on her, kicked Lindsay's still open suitcase over a few feet, causing Lindsay to trip over it and release Shawn. Ewing jumped forward before she could regain her balance and tackled her, tossing the gun away.

"Great work," Juliet said, walking over to Aislinn as Lassiter led a handcuffed Lindsay back toward the squad car.

"Thanks," Aislinn said, smiling, then she turned to follow Shawn and Gus back to Gus's car. "Sorry! I tried to call you as soon as I knew it was Lindsay but I left my phone in your car," she said once they were back in Gus's car.

"I figured it out," Shawn said, shrugging and grinning back at her. "Well, I'm hungry. Let's get lunch."

"I hear that," Gus said, pulling out of the parking lot and heading toward a taco place they all liked.


End file.
